A Method to Estimate the Production Rate of a Stream Bottom Invertebrate
- 1 July 1962
- journal article
- Published by Oxford University Press (OUP) in Transactions of the American Fisheries Society
- Vol. 91 (3) , 243-250
- https://doi.org/10.1577/1548-8659(1962)91[243:amtetp]2.0.co;2
Abstract
An approach toward the development of a method to estimate the production rate of primary consumers in a stream was as follows: For a given unit area of stream bottom, the production rate (B) is equal to the algebraic sum of the rate of change in population density (P) and the difference between the rates of removal (R) and accrual (A): Since removal and accrual both appear, for certain species, to be principally in the form of downstream drift, minimal production rates could be estimated with data on population density and total drift into and off of the unit areas of study. Population density data were obtained from periodic bottom samples, and drift nets were employed in a sampling procedure to estimate total drift rates at the various stream stations. Production rates of a mayfly, Baetis vagans McDunnough, were estimated for two 24‐hour periods in two riffles and two pools. The mean production rate on the riffles was 0.28 gram per square meter per day. In the pools, B was negative, indicating consumption; consumption rate in the pools was 0.45 gram per square meter per day.This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: