Interactions among stressors may be weak: Implications for management of freshwater macroinvertebrate communities

摘要: Aim: Ecological models that do not account for interactions among stressors, if are important, could be inaccurate and lead to inefficient conservation strategies. Conversely, important (i.e., stressors operate largely independently), then actions concentrating on a stressor-by- stressor basis would warranted. Here, we investigated whether multiple affected widely used indices of freshwater macroinvertebrate biodiversity, which sensitive environmental change at management-relevant scales reaches catchments). Location: State Victoria, south-eastern Australia. Methods: We 7,418-sample dataset stream macroinvertebrates from 2,165 sites distributed over 237,630 km2 20 years. calculated the interactive effects operating different scales, namely vegetation loss catchment reach hydrological salinization local scale. The importance was assessed by comparing cross-validated predictive performance with without interaction terms. Results: Cross-validated explained 31%–63% variation in responses. most were (the proportion remaining native cover) salinity. inclusion terms did increase performance, indicates there little evidence explaining commonly condition indices. Main conclusions: Interactions vegetation, salinity may always determining patterns so such necessarily critical considerations scale management, least based these or comparable indices. mitigation impacts loss, one-by- one probably is sufficient guide activities might advantageous socio-political contexts make it difficult address stressors.