Improving the assessment of groundwater biodiversity by exploring environmental heterogeneity at regional scale

CASTELLARINI, F.; DOLE-OLIVIER, M-J.; MALARD, F.; GIBERT, J.

Villeurbanne, Francia

Simposio; Symposium on World Subterranean Biodiversity; 2004

Universidad Claude Bernard Lyon I

The assessment of groundwater biodiversity has the inherent and recurrent problem related to the accessibility of the groundwater environment. This study explored potential sources of environmental heterogeneity to improve sampling strategies developed for the assessment of the stygobiotic species richness. Thus random and stratified strategies were analyzed for 247 sites in the southern Jura (France). Decentred Correspondence Analysis (DCOA), Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and correlation analysis showed significant relationships between the species richness patterns and the main sources of heterogeneity (habitat structure, elevation and historic events).