Multi-angle views on effect of river regulation on breeding habitat of Little Tern
by Guangwei Huang
International Journal of Environment and Pollution (IJEP), Vol. 58, No. 3, 2015

Abstract: It is already well known that river regulation influences biota via disrupting the natural flow regime in addition to causing physical barrier for the movement of aquatic life and material. However, studies often looked into various effects in an isolated manner and paid little attention to animal adaptive behaviour. In this work, the influence of river regulation by dam operation on the breeding habitat of the Little Tern was studied from a coast-river continuum perspective. It was found that there was a decade-long time lag between flow regulation and the degradation of coastal habitat in the case investigated. As the coastal habitat degradation became manifested, a habitat use shift occurred from coast to river. On the other hand, the riverine habitat was affected by river regulation both positively and negatively. The positive aspect is the reduction in flooding risk of breeding colony, and the negative effect is the vegetation development on the habitat, which is out of favour by the bird. As a net result, the bird did not abandon the riverine habitat although its physical characteristics may be considered as suboptimal. The findings suggest that species adaptive behaviours should be taken into consideration in assessing environmental impacts caused by human activities such as dam development.

Online publication date: Wed, 22-Jun-2016

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