Relating species richness, upland coldwater fish species, and temperature in North Georgia’s trout streams
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Author(s)
Jones, Krista
Poole, Geoffrey
Meyer, Judy
Advisor(s)
Editor(s)
Hatcher, Kathryn J.
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Abstract
The Georgia legislature recently reduced
the mandatory riparian buffer width on primary trout
streams from 100 to 50 ft. To evaluate the potential
effects of this policy change, the Trout Stream Buffer
Study established 30 sites along primary trout streams
in North Georgia. We investigated the relationships
between fish diversity and temperature conditions. In
2001, fish population data were collected yielding
relative abundance data on 49 fish species representing
8 families. Species richness was positively correlated
with and significantly related to stream temperatures.
Since previous studies have suggested that the species
richness measure is likely not to reflect shifts in
community composition from upland specialist to
lowland generalist fish species, we conducted a
preliminary investigation of the relationship between
the relative abundance of highland endemic and upland
restricted fish species and stream temperature. A
significant negative relationship exists between
increasing temperature and the relative abundance of
highland endemic and upland restricted fish species.
This suggests that stream temperature is one of the
variables contributing to the distribution of upland
coldwater and lowland warm water fishes.
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Date
2003-04
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Resource Type
Text
Resource Subtype
Proceedings