Aquatic macroinvertebrate biodiversity associated with artificial agricultural drainage ditches
Open accessAbstract
Agricultural drainage ditches are ubiquitous features in lowland agricultural landscapes, built primarily to facilitate land drainage, irrigate agricultural crops and alleviate flood risk. Most drainage ditches are considered artificial waterbodies and are not typically included in routine monitoring programmes, and as a result the faunal and floral communities they support are poorly quantified. This paper characterises the aquatic macroinvertebrate diversity (alpha, beta and gamma) of agricultural drainage ditches managed by an internal drainage board in Lincolnshire, UK. The drainage ditches support very diverse macroinvertebrate communities at both the site (alpha diversity) and landscape scale (gamma diversity) with the main arterial drainage ditches supporting greater numbers of taxa when compared to smaller side ditches. Examination of the between site community heterogeneity (beta diversity) indicated that differences among ditches were high spatially and temporally. The results illustrate that both main arterial and side ditches make a unique contribution to aquatic biodiversity of the agricultural landscape. Given the need to maintain drainage ditches to support agriculture and flood defence measures, we advocate the application of principles from ‘reconciliation ecology’ to inform the future management and conservation of drainage ditches.
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Ditches can support a high biodiversity of aquatic macroinvertebrates, waterbirds, amphibians, macrophytes and fish.
“and can support a high biodiversity of aquatic macroinvertebrates 106,187 ), waterbirds 188,189 , amphibians 190 , macrophytes 191,192 and fish 193,194 .”
From Lines in the landscape (2025) · cites this paper as [187]
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- Authors
- Hill, M. J., Chadd, R. P., Morris, N., Swaine, J. D., & Wood, P. J.
- Affiliations
- Loughborough University (GB)
- Environment Agency (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Wood, P. J.
- Venue
- Hydrobiologia
- Published
- 2016-04-16
- Volume
- 776
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 249-260
- ISSN
- 0018-8158 (ISSN-L)
- 1573-5117
- OpenAlex
- W2336449597
- Cited by
- 34
- References
- 44
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 1
- FWCI
- 2.63
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Hydrobiologia (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Worcester Research and Publications (University of Worcester) (submittedVersion)
- Loughborough University Institutional Repository (Loughborough University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Loughborough University Research Repository (Loughborough University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- School of Social, Political and Geographical Sciences, Loughborough University
- Environment Agency of England and Wales
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Freshwater macroinvertebrate diversity and ecology
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Invertebrate Taxonomy and Ecology
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Ecology and biodiversity studies
- Keywords
- agricultural drainage ditches, aquatic macroinvertebrates, biodiversity, alpha diversity, beta diversity, gamma diversity, reconciliation ecology, flood control, Lincolnshire
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