How’s Our Watershed’s Health?

Presentation on theme: "How’s Our Watershed’s Health?"— Presentation transcript:

1 How’s Our Watershed’s Health?
Ask your “Stomach-Feet” and Mussels

2 David C. Richards, Ph. D. OreoHelix Consulting
Theron Miller, Ph. D. Wasatch Front Water Quality Council Our guide for this presentation: Mountain snail, Oreohelix strigosa

3 What is Watershed Health?
Some useful definitions Other ideas Clean Water Act Physical, chemical, biological integrity Protection and propagation of fish and shellfish Ecosystem function Ecosystem services? Natural disturbance Resistance/Resilience CWA mantra: “Maintain and improve the physical, chemical, and biological integrity of our nations waters” What is Biological Integrity? Good question. Maybe we will get into it in this presentation Part of CWA we often miss: “…so that they can support the protection and propagation of fish, shellfish, and wildlife….” By definition Mollusks are shellfish Many, many other ideas of what watershed health is Focus on aquatic portion of watershed , specifically macroinvertebrates Other components: primary and secondary productivity TMDLs = chemical integrity? That somehow are based on how they affect biological integrity. But if biota aren't responding then what are their purpose? Duh, but only if you are aquatic I’m a shellfish? Eat me

4 SLCW Waterbodies Many types: All require different measures of health
“Growth for growth’s sake is the ideology of the cancer cell” SLCW Waterbodies Many types: Cold mountain streams Really, really, unique and amazing, large lakes/reservoirs e.g. the one and only Utah Lake-reservoir and GSL River Jordan (unique) Spring creeks (severely under protected) Spring seeps (severely under protected) Wetlands All require different measures of health All are severely threatened by our drunken intoxication with growth The River Jordan is indeed unique. A large portion of its flow is from a very large shallow water lake (Sea of Galilee e.g Utah Lake) and it flows into a huge terminal salt lake (Dead Sea e.g. GSL). All of these water body types have at least one thing in common: Mollusks

5 How should we/could we measure watershed health?
Biological Metrics Taxa Richness (Diversity)? RIVPACS O/E ? Other richness based metrics (e.g. EPT richness) Functional traits Resistance/resilience Disturbance frequency Richness based metrics: Ephemeroptera Plecoptera Trichoptera Chironomids FFG Shredders Scrapers Filterers Collector/gatherers Functional Traits Sprawlers Clingers Please don’t rely on one single metric to evaluate watershed health, no matter how well you think it works. SLCW waters are to unique and valuable Resistance = how well a watershed resists environmental change Resilience = how well a watershed rebounds to original state after environmental change Resiilience is often misunderstood. Example: wetlands biota rebounding after drying out on a regular basis is not resilience. That is its natural cycle. Many, many, more measures of watershed health My recommendation: get to know your taxa by name, learn their life history, biology, and ecology and then directly employ them and listen carefully to what they have to say Seems like there are more metrics than there are taxa

6 Richness Metrics = Huge Problem
Richness metrics = most widely used Underestimate ecological impacts Impacts often affect function not richness Shifts in: Population dynamics Community structure Large lag time Use of richness based metrics used/abused for a long, long time. They need to be critically evaluated and likely demoted in rank. Please read: Ecology Letters, (2017) 20: 1315–1324. “Shifts of community composition and population density substantially affect ecosystem function despite invariant Richness”

7 Show of hands please Who thinks it is a cool and attainable goal of establishing a human colony on Mars or the Moon? Who thinks it is a cool and attainable goal of watershed health conditions similar to those prior to Mormon settlement? After click and second question: Say, "which brings us to the next slide"

8 The Curse of Shifting Baselines
Numero Uno Cop-Out Need to establish a baseline Each time we do, it gets further and further away from ‘pristine’ as an obtainable goal Please ignore regionwide ‘reference’ criteria Waterbodies in SLCW are too unique for that We seem to lower the bar for our baseline conditions on a whim. For whatever reason we just cant stick to our goals As our little mountain snail guide reminds us: Global climate change is indeed shifting our baselines for us. We need to adapt accourdingly. Ha. Global climate change is messing with our baseline as you speak Dr. Richards

9 How is our Watershed Health? Ask your Stomach-Feet and Mussels
Snails = Gastro pods = “Stomach” “Feet” Mussels (+ Clams) = Bivalves Snails + Bivalves = Mollusks Mollusks have been given a bad rap by water quality managers i.e. Mollusks = “pollution tolerant”. Therefore their occurrence = poor condition That is just not ecologically true, especially in our watershed OreoHelix

10 What is a Freshwater Mollusk?
Gastropods Bivalves Snails Mussels Clams

11 Native Mussels Only 2 taxa Margaritifera falcata, Western Pearlshell
Anodonta sp., Floater We will ignore the native fingernail clams for this presentation. Their taxonomy and ecology are so poorly known.

12 Prosobranchs: Family Hydrobiidae
Amnicola limosus Mud Amnicola Colligyrus greggi (Pilsbry, 1935) Rocky Mountain Dusky Snail Tryonia porrecta (Mighels, 1845) Desert Tryonia Pyrgulopsis anguina Hershler, 1998 Longitudinal Gland Pyrg Pyrgulopsis chamberlini Hershler, 1998 Smooth Glenwood Pyrg Pyrgulopsis deserta (Pilsbry, 1916) Desert Springsnail Pyrgulopsis fusca Hershler, 1998 Otter Creek Pyrg Pyrgulopsis hamlinensis Hershler, 1998 Hamlin Valley Pyrg Pyrgulopsis inopinata Hershler, 1998 Carinate Glenwood Pyrg Pyrgulopsis kolobensis (Taylor, 1987) Toquerville Springsnail Pyrgulopsis nonaria Hershler, 1998 Ninemile Pyrg Pyrgulopsis peculiaris Hershler, 1998 Bifid Duct Pyrg Pyrgulopsis pilsbryana (Bailey and Bailey,1952) Bear Lake Springsnail Pyrgulopsis plicata Hershler, 1998 Black Canyon Pyrg Pyrgulopsis saxatilis Hershler, 1998 Sub-globose Snake Pyrg Pyrgulopsis variegata Hershler, 1998 Northwest Bonneville Pyrg Pyrgulopsis transversa southern Bonneville springsnail Fluminicola coloradoensis Morrison, 1940 Green River pebblesnail Standard Pyrg Standard Pyrg Fluminicola sp.

13 Springsnails Genus: Pyrgulopsis
Highly endemic Many only in isolated springs The rest of the country is springsnail depauperate. SLCW seems to be a hotspot. The distribution of Pyrgulopsis, based on records in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and several other repositories. Hershler et al. 2014

14 Pulmonates: Family Ancylidae
Heterobranchs: Family Valvatidae Valvata humeralis Say, 1829 Glossy Valvata Valvata tricarinata (Say, 1817) Threeridge Valvata Valvata utahensis Call, 1884 Desert Valvata Pulmonates: Family Ancylidae One of my favorites: Desert Valvata or Utah Valvata. Believed to be extinct in UT. Ferrissia rivularis creeping ancylid

15 Family Physidae Aplexa elongate lance aplexa
Physa megalochlamys Taylor, 1988 Cloaked Physa Physa skinneri Taylor, 1954 Glass Physa Physella cooperi (Tryon, 1865) Olive Physa Physella gyrina (Say, 1821) Tadpole Physa Physella lordi (Baird, 1863) Twisted Physa Physella microstriata (Chamberlain and Berry, 1930) Fish Lake Physa Physella propinqua (Tryon, 1865) Rocky Mountain Physa Physella utahensis (Clench, 1925) Utah Physa Physella virgata (Gould, 1855) Protean Physa Physella zionis (Pilsbry, 1926) Wet-rock Physa Taxonomy is poorly described. Maybe only one or two species

16 Family Lymnaidae Fisherola nuttalli (Haldeman, 1841) Shortface Lanx
Galba bulimoides (Lea, 1841) Prairie Fossaria Galba dalli (Baker, 1907) Dusky Fossaria Galba modicella (Say, 1825) Rock Fossaria Galba obrussa (Say, 1825) Golden Fossaria Galba parva (Lea, 1841) Pygmy Fossaria Galba rustica (Lea, 1841) Rusty Fossaria Galba techella Haldeman, 1867 [uncertain classification] Stagnicola apicina (Lea, 1838) Abbreviate Pondsnail Stagnicola bonnevillensis (Call, 1884) Fat-Whorled Pondsnail Stagnicola caperata (Say, 1829) Wrinkled Marshsnail Stagnicola elodes (Say, 1821) Marsh Pondsnail Stagnicola montanensis (Baker, 1913) Mountain Marshsnail Stagnicola pilsbryi (Hemphill, 1890) Fish Springs Marshsnail Stagnicola traski (Tryon, 1863) Widelip Pondsnail Stagnicola utahensis (Call, 1884) Thickshell Pondsnail

17 Mollusks Rule(d) the Henhouse
When abundant (i.e. the recent past): Ecosystem engineers Determine nutrient cycles and spirals Link between sediments and water column Regulate algal blooms Water quality controllers Ecosystem functioning depends on mollusks We like to think mayflies are such important indicators. They are cool. But collectively they are just mostly a bunch of collector/gatherers. Nothing compared to the role of mollusks in determining watershed health. You freeloader

18 Decline of the mollusks
SLC watershed was once a hotspot of freshwater mollusk diversity Unique in the world A true UT and SLCW natural heritage that doesn’t need to be lost Look at that clean water!

19 Utah Lake example Can you imagine a time when there were so many native mussels filtering algae in Utah Lake that it was much clearer and had significantly fewer algal blooms? Or there were so many snail species that benthic algae didn’t stand a chance? i.e. snails = the algal eaters. You still can get somewhat of an idea by learning about the role invasive Asian clams and NZMS are now playing in our watershed. Utah Lake historically had 17 mollusk taxa, now 2 or 3

20 Relicts of a time gone by
I highly recommend you take a walk along the shores of UT Lake when water levels once again recede East shore Goshen Bay

21 Native Mussel Dispersal and Life History
Mussel viability dependent on fish host viability Some mollusks are just plain weird This is why native mussels are having such a difficult time and are leaving us.

22 Just a few reasons for their demise
Loss of fish hosts Dispersal limited Loss of connectivity Invasive species Dewatering Channelization Urbanization Agricultural practices Decreased water quality Mollusk populations Human population Past Present Future Some invasive species that are wrecking havouc on native mussel populations include: carp, crayfish, Asian clams, and NZMS

23 Population Viability, the Extinction Vortex, and Extinction Debt
“All hope abandon ye who enter here”1,2 If you arent familiar with these terms, take the time to learn a little bit about them. Extinction Vortex Ride = once you get on this you arent likely to get off and survive unless somehow you get lucky and come out the worm hole into another universe Extinction Debt = No matter how much you pay in interest the remaining negative extinction balance will earn you a free ticket on the Extinction Vortex Ride without a seatbelt Our native mollusks either have already bought tickets to the ride or are thinking about it. Like the good stewards that we are, We need to take them by the mouth-foot or antennae and drag them home. 1306 2Captain Jack Sparrow

24 Our Research Most extensive/intensive native mussel survey in Utah Lake/Jordan River drainage ever Margaritifera likely extinct in drainage Anodonta limited to perhaps 3 tiny, isolated, populations with no connectivity No populations in SLC Asian clams >10,000/m2 (world record densities?) NZMS > 250,000/m2 Report available at: Check out our report. We talk about some really cool mussel stuff. Life history, ecosystem effects, metapopulations, extinction vortex., Very Impressive!

25 Mussel viability = f {(fish host density, adult mussel density, successful glochidia (glochidia density*fish host distance )}

26 Mollusk Metric Continuum
The Essential Metric Watershed Health: Mollusk Metric Continuum Poor Excellent No natives Invasives dominate Full suite of native taxa Viable historic levels No Invasives or at very low levels Metapopulations = slightly interacting populations within a larger populations. Dispersal between populations limited and connected. Each population has its own extinction risk and each blinks in and out of extinction but is rescued by nearby population. I can live with that

27 Conclusion Many informative methods to evaluate watershed health
Richness metrics do a poor job Native mollusks most important regulators of historic ecosystem functioning Viable populations almost guarantee watershed health (including world class fisheries) Native mollusks should be front and center

28 We may be slow but we rock! Questions?