Understanding the Effects of Flow Rate on Population Distribution of Water Boatmen Corixidae

• Haley Carrasco

  Juniata College

  Author

Flow rate is the volume of fluid that flows past a fixed point in an stream. The flow is a function of water volume and velocity that can be effected by weather or seasonal changes. This is important because it has an impact on water quality and living organisms as well has the habitat in the stream. This study was performed to test the effect that the abiotic factor of flow rate can have on habitat and if the change increases the mortality of Water Boatman (Corixidae). A transplant study was conducted on a total of sixteen Water Boatmen that were collected from a lake site with no flow. Half of the insects collected were placed back into the site where it was collected from and the other half was placed in a creek with a fast flow rate. The experiment was run for a total of a week. The data collected encompasses whether the species were living or dead in both the control and transplanted site. The results indicate that Water Boatman were unaffected by the abiotic factor of flow rate. This suggests that the abiotic factor is not what is preventing the distribution of the species. Overall the data demonstrates that flow rate had no correlation to the mortality of Water Boatman.

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