A Structured Approach for Developing Indices of Biotic Integrity: Three Examples from Streams and Rivers in the Western USA

Abstract In the late 1990s the Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency developed a structured set of tests to evaluate and facilitate selection of metrics for indices of biotic integrity (IBIs). These IBIs were designed to be applicable across multistate regions as part of a national assessment of all U.S. waters. Here, we present additional steps in, and refinements to, that IBI development process. We used fish and amphibian assemblage data from 932 stream and river sites in 12 western U.S. states to develop IBIs for Mountains, Xeric, and Plains ecoregions. We divided 237 candidate metrics into nine metric classes representing different attributes of assemblage structure and function. For each ecoregion we sequentially eliminated metrics by testing metric range, signal-to-noise ratios, responsiveness to disturbance, and redundancy to select the best metric in each class. The IBIs for the Mountains and Plains each had seven metrics and the Xeric IBI had...

[1]  C. Seeliger,et al.  Quantifying physical habitat in wadeable streams : surface waters , 1999 .

[2]  Richard H. Norris,et al.  Monitoring river health , 2000, Hydrobiologia.

[3]  Thomas P. Simon,et al.  Assessing the Sustainability and Biological Integrity of Water Resources Using Fish Communities , 2020 .

[4]  S. Weisberg,et al.  Maryland Biological Stream Survey: Development of a Fish Index of Biotic Integrity , 1998 .

[5]  W. Hilsenhoff.  Use of arthropods to evaluate water quality of streams [Wisconsin] , 1977 .

[6]  F. Ciutti,et al.  Il carpione del Garda (Salmo carpio): variabilità genetica e relazioni filogenetiche rispetto al complesso Salmo trutta , 2006 .

[7]  R. J. Stevenson,et al.  Use of periphyton assemblage data as an index of biotic integrity , 2000, Journal of the North American Benthological Society.

[8]  J. Stoddard,et al.  Development and Evaluation of a Macroinvertebrate Biotic Integrity Index (MBII) for Regionally Assessing Mid-Atlantic Highlands Streams , 2003, Environmental management.

[9]  Robert M. Hughes,et al.  Development of an Index of Biotic Integrity for the Mid-Atlantic Highlands Region , 2001 .

[10]  Wayne S. Davis,et al.  Biological assessment and criteria : tools for water resource planning and decision making , 1995 .

[11]  M. Barbour,et al.  Rapid bioassessment protocols for use in streams and wadeable rivers: periphyton , 1999 .

[12]  F. M. Chutter,et al.  AN EMPIRICAL BIOTIC INDEX OF THE QUALITY OF WATER IN SOUTH AFRICAN STREAMS AND RIVERS , 1972 .

[13]  W. F. Sigler,et al.  Fishes of Utah: A Natural History , 1996 .

[14]  L. Jackson,et al.  BIRD GUILDS AS INDICATORS OF ECOLOGICAL CONDITION IN THE CENTRAL APPALACHIANS , 2000 .

[15]  R. Hughes,et al.  An Index of Biological Integrity (IBI) for Pacific Northwest Rivers , 2003 .

[16]  Richard H. Norris,et al.  DEVELOPMENT AND EVALUATION OF PREDICTIVE MODELS FOR MEASURING THE BIOLOGICAL INTEGRITY OF STREAMS , 2000 .

[17]  James R. Karr,et al.  Ecological perspective on water quality goals , 1981 .

[18]  T G Kovacs,et al.  Assessing the biological status of fish in a river receiving pulp and paper mill effluents. , 2002, Environmental pollution.

[19]  C. J. Brown.  Fishes of Montana , 1972 .

[20]  J. W. Sigler.  Fishes of the Great Basin: A Natural History , 1987 .

[21]  R. Hughes,et al.  Fish and Amphibian Tolerance Values and an Assemblage Tolerance Index for Streams and Rivers in the Western USA , 2007 .

[22]  C. Hawkins.  Quantifying biological integrity by taxonomic completeness: its utility in regional and global assessments. , 2006, Ecological applications : a publication of the Ecological Society of America.

[23]  R. Whitney,et al.  Inland Fishes of Washington , 1979 .

[24]  Jeffrey S. Shearer,et al.  Index of Biotic Integrity Utility for the Fishery of the James River of the Dakotas , 2002 .

[25]  J. Karr.  Seven Foundations of Biological Monitoring and Assessment , 2006 .

[26]  Leska S. Fore.  Response of Diatom Assemblages to Human Disturbance: Development and Testing of a Multimetric Index for the Mid-Atlantic Region (USA) , 2002 .

[27]  J. Karr.  Assessment of Biotic Integrity Using Fish Communities , 1981 .

[28]  David Gilvear,et al.  James R. Karr and Ellen W. Chu, Restoring Life in Running Waters: Better Biological Monitoring , 1999 .

[29]  C.J.F. ter Braak,et al.  Diatoms and pH Reconstruction , 1990 .

[30]  R. Hughes,et al.  A Biointegrity Index (IBI) for Coldwater Streams of Western Oregon and Washington , 2004 .

[31]  R. Hughes,et al.  Applications of IBI Concepts and Metrics to Waters Outside the United States and Canada , 2020 .

[32]  Donald J. Orth,et al.  Application and Testing of an Index of Biotic Integrity in Small, Coolwater Streams , 1986 .

[33]  K. Blocksom.  A Performance Comparison of Metric Scoring Methods for a Multimetric Index for Mid-Atlantic Highlands Streams , 2003, Environmental management.

[34]  S. Bryce.  Development of a Bird Integrity Index: Measuring Avian Response to Disturbance in the Blue Mountains of Oregon, USA , 2006, Environmental management.

[35]  D. Pereira,et al.  Development of a Fish-Based Index of Biotic Integrity for Small Inland Lakes in Central Minnesota , 2002 .

[36]  James R. Karr,et al.  Assessing biological integrity in running waters : a method and its rationale , 1986 .

[37]  Stanley V. Gregory,et al.  Electrofishing Effort Requirements for Assessing Species Richness and Biotic Integrity in Western Oregon Streams , 2003 .

[38]  C.J.F. ter Braak,et al.  Weighted averaging of species indicator values: Its efficiency in environmental calibration , 1986 .

[39]  J. Karr,et al.  Restoring life in running waters : better biological monitoring , 1998 .

[40]  Robert M. Hughes,et al.  Longitudinal Changes in Fish Assemblages and Water Quality in the Willamette River, Oregon , 1987 .

[41]  J. Omernik.  Ecoregions of the Conterminous United States , 1987 .

[42]  J. Lyons,et al.  Index of Biotic Integrity Based on Fish Assemblages for the Conservation of Streams and Rivers in West‐Central Mexico , 1995 .

[43]  C. Seeliger,et al.  QUANTIFYING PHYSICAL HABITAT IN , 1999 .

[44]  R. Hughes,et al.  A process for developing and evaluating indices of fish assemblage integrity , 1998 .

[45]  R. Hughes,et al.  Evaluation of Fish Species Tolerances to Environmental Stressors in Lakes in the Northeastern United States , 1998 .

[46]  Robert M. Hughes,et al.  Electrofishing Distance Needed to Estimate Fish Species Richness in Raftable Oregon Rivers , 2002 .

[47]  R. L. Wallace,et al.  Fishes of Idaho , 1982 .

[48]  Robert G. Randall,et al.  An Index of Biotic Integrity (IBI) for Fish Assemblages in the Littoral Zone of Great Lakes' Areas of Concern , 1994 .

[49]  J. R. Stauffer,et al.  Atlas of North American Freshwater Fishes , 1980 .

[50]  S. Hubler,et al.  Using Field Data to Estimate the Realized Thermal Niche of Aquatic Vertebrates , 2005 .

[51]  James R. Karr,et al.  Sustaining living rivers , 2000, Hydrobiologia.

[52]  James R. Karr,et al.  Regional Applications of an Index of Biotic Integrity for Use in Water Resource Management , 1988 .

[53]  J. Stoddard,et al.  Selecting reference sites for stream biological assessments: best professional judgment or objective criteria , 2007, Journal of the North American Benthological Society.

[54]  Erich Emery,et al.  Development of a Multimetric Index for Assessing the Biological Condition of the Ohio River , 2003 .

[55]  K. Fausch,et al.  Variable fish communities and the index of biotic integrity in a Western Great Plains river , 1991 .

[56]  R. Hughes,et al.  Historical changes in large river fish assemblages of the Americas , 2005 .

[57]  Inland Fishes of California , 1976 .

[58]  J. Heslop-Harrison.  An Ecological Perspective , 1958, Nature.

[59]  W. Hilsenhoff,et al.  An Improved Biotic Index of Organic Stream Pollution , 2017, The Great Lakes Entomologist.

[60]  John Lyons,et al.  Development and Validation of an Index of Biotic Integrity for Coldwater Streams in Wisconsin , 1996 .

[61]  Robert R. Miller,et al.  Fishes of Arizona , 1974 .

[62]  James R. Karr,et al.  A Benthic Index of Biotic Integrity (B-IBI) for Rivers of the Tennessee Valley , 1994 .

[63]  A. Zale,et al.  Development and Evaluation of a Fish Assemblage Index of Biotic Integrity for Northwestern Great Plains Streams , 2005 .

[64]  J. Lyons,et al.  Development, Validation, and Application of a Fish-Based Index of Biotic Integrity for Wisconsin's Large Warmwater Rivers , 2001 .

[65]  John L Stoddard,et al.  Setting expectations for the ecological condition of streams: the concept of reference condition. , 2005, Ecological applications : a publication of the Ecological Society of America.

[66]  Alan T. Herlihy,et al.  Assessment of streams of the eastern United States using a periphyton index of biotic integrity , 2003 .

[67]  J. Karr,et al.  A terrestrial arthropod index of biological integrity for shrub-steppe landscapes , 2003 .

[68]  D. Goffaux,et al.  Assessing river biotic condition at a continental scale: a European approach using functional metrics and fish assemblages , 2006 .

[69]  R. Bailey,et al.  Fishes of South Dakota , 1962 .

[70]  Thierry Oberdorff,et al.  Development and validation of a fish-based index for the assessment of ‘river health’ in France , 2002 .

[71]  A. Olsen,et al.  Spatially Balanced Sampling of Natural Resources , 2004 .

[72]  R. Hughes,et al.  Landscape influences on stream habitats and biological assemblages , 2006 .

[73]  I. Cowx,et al.  Nonindigenous Fishes Introduced into Inland Waters of the United States , 2000 .

[74]  Susan K. Jackson,et al.  The biological condition gradient: a descriptive model for interpreting change in aquatic ecosystems. , 2006, Ecological applications : a publication of the Ecological Society of America.