DIVERSITYOFECOSYSTEMS EditedbyMahamaneAli DIVERSITYOFECOSYSTEMS  EditedbyMahamaneAli            Diversity of Ecosystems Edited by Mahamane Ali Published by InTech Janeza Trdine 9, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia Copyright © 2012 InTech All chapters are Open Access distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, which allows users to download, copy and build upon published articles even for commercial purposes, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. After this work has been published by InTech, authors have the right to republish it, in whole or part, in any publication of which they are the author, and to make other personal use of the work. Any republication, referencing or personal use of the work must explicitly identify the original source. As for readers, this license allows users to download, copy and build upon published chapters even for commercial purposes, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. Notice Statements and opinions expressed in the chapters are these of the individual contributors and not necessarily those of the editors or publisher. No responsibility is accepted for the accuracy of information contained in the published chapters. The publisher assumes no responsibility for any damage or injury to persons or property arising out of the use of any materials, instructions, methods or ideas contained in the book. Publishing Process Manager Jana Sertic Technical Editor Teodora Smiljanic Cover Designer InTech Design Team First published April, 2012 Printed in Croatia A free online edition of this book is available at www.intechopen.com Additional hard copies can be obtained from orders@intechopen.com Diversity of Ecosystems, Edited by Mahamane Ali p. cm. ISBN 978-953-51-0572-5    Contents  Preface IX Chapter 1 Macrofaunistic Diversity in Vallisneria americana Michx. in a Tropical Wetland, Southern Gulf of Mexico 1 Alberto J. Sánchez, Rosa Florido, Miguel Ángel Salcedo, Violeta Ruiz-Carrera, Hugo Montalvo-Urgel and Andrea Raz-Guzman Chapter 2 Impacts of Carbon Dioxide Gas Leaks from Geological Storage Sites on Soil Ecology and Above-Ground Vegetation 27 Raveendra H. Patil Chapter 3 How to Keep Deep-Sea Animals 51 Hiroshi Miyake, Mitsugu Kitada, Dhugal J. Lindsay, Toshishige Itoh, Suguru Nemoto and Tetsuya Miwa Chapter 4 An Introduced Polychaete in South America – Ecologic Affinities of Manayunkia speciosa (Polychaeta, Sabellidae) and the Oligochaetes of Uruguay River, Argentina 73 Laura Armendáriz, Fernando Spaccesi and Alberto Rodrigues Capítulo Chapter 5 Evaluation of Aquatic Ecosystem Health Using the Potential Non Point Pollution Index (PNPI) Tool 95 Camilla Puccinelli, Stefania Marcheggiani, Michele Munafò, Paolo Andreani and Laura Mancini Chapter 6 Long Term Changes in Abundance and Spatial Distribution of Pelagic Agonidae, Ammodytidae, Liparidae, Cottidae, Myctophidae and Stichaeidae in the Barents Sea 109 Elena Eriksen, Tatyana Prokhorova and Edda Johannesen Chapter 7 Rangelands in Arid Ecosystem 127 Selim Zedan Heneidy VI Contents Chapter 8 Desertification-Climate Change Interactions – Mexico's Battle Against Desertification 167 Carlos Arturo Aguirre-Salado, Eduardo Javier Treviño-Garza, Oscar Alberto Aguirre-Calderón, Javier Jiménez-Pérez, Marco Aurelio González-Tagle and José René Valdez-Lazalde Chapter 9 Envisioning Ecosystems – Biodiversity, Infirmity and Affectivity 183 Diana Domingues, Cristiano Miosso, Lourdes Brasil, Rafael Morgado and Adson Rocha Chapter 10 Ecological Research of Arctic Restricted Exchange Environments (Kandalaksha Bay, White Sea, Russian Arctic) 199 Sofia Koukina, Alexander Vetrov and Nikolai Belyaev Chapter 11 Two Species and Three Species Ecological Modeling – Homotopy Analysis 221 Venkata Sundaranand Putcha Chapter 12 Stable Isotope Research in Southern African Birds 251 Craig T. Symes Chapter 13 The Impact of Shelterbelts on Mulch Decomposition and Colonization by Fauna in Adjacent Fields 289 M. Szanser Chapter 14 New Technologies for Ecosystem Analysis Planning and Management 299 Pietro Picuno, Alfonso Tortora, Carmela Sica and Rocco Capobianco Chapter 15 Extreme Climatic Events as Drivers of Ecosystem Change 339 Robert C. Godfree Chapter 16 Primary Producers of the Barents Sea 367 Pavel Makarevich, Elena Druzhkova and Viktor Larionov Chapter 17 Protecting Ecosystems from Underground Invasions – Seed Bank Dynamics in a Semi-Arid Shrub-Steppe 393 David R. Clements and Lynne B. Atwood Chapter 18 Changes to Marine Trophic Networks Caused by Fishing 417 Andrés F. Navia, Enric Cortés, Ferenc Jordán, Víctor H. Cruz-Escalona and Paola A. Mejía-Falla Contents VII Chapter 19 Diversity and Dynamics of Plant Communities in Niger River Valley (W Regional Park) 453 A. Mahamane, M. Zaman Allah, M. Saadou and J. Lejoly Chapter 20 Ecological Flexibility of the Top Predator in an Island Ecosystem – Food Habit of the Iriomote Cat 465 Shinichi Watanabe   Preface  Ifweunanimouslyagreethatthesurvivalofeach livingorganismdependsonthenature and ecological services rendered by ecosystems, we mu st equ a lly agree unanimously that these ecosystems do not always benefit the required attention. Hence they are subjectedtomanytreats.Indeed,theecosystemsaresu bjectedtomanypressingus ages at unknown tole r able  levels. It generally results to equilibrium breaks leading ineluctably to their degradation. This tend en cy  has engendered many international initiativestopreventecosystemsdegradation.Forinstance,theBiodiversityConvention, UnitedNationsConventiontoCombactDesertification(UNCCD),etc. Regardingtothemagnitudeandmodificationconsequencesofecosystems,theUnited Nationshavecommend edthestudyonMillenniumEcosystemsAssessment(MA).In order to better conserve the ecosystems and their services, it will be better to understand these ecosystems in all their complexity. It is to this aim that this book suggestssomecasestudiesundertakingallcontinents. Indeed we try to fill the gap on th e knowledge on ecosystems diversity and functioning. Since we have started the book project, we were invaded by many chaptersoncurrentenvironmentalissuesfromreputableinternationalresearchteams and laboratories. This shows that this book has aroused many interests from internationalscientificcommunitygiventheimportantnumberofchapte rssubmitted form the beginning. Consequently, we were subjected to make selection.We use this opportunity to thank the Publisher for publishing this book to the benefit of the internationalscientificcommunity. This book is educational and useful to students, researchers and all those are interestedinenv ironmentalissues. Thisvolumeoffersacompilationof20chaptersonthesamplingmethodsofterrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, the algorithms meant for phytoplankton evaluation using satellites data, the biodiversity of arid regions ecosystems, the dynamics of grazed ecosystems in arid regions, the primary production of oceanic and terrestrial ecosystems,thedevelopm entofnewtechniquesonecosystemsanalysis,thedynamics of carbon on forestry ecosystems, the prey‐predator relationship within ecosystems, thedynamicsofanimalpopulationbasedonmanyenvironmentalgradients,etc. X Preface Weareinvitingstudents,researchers,teachersandpeopleinterestedinenvironmental issuestoreadthisbookwhichiseducationalconsideringthedifferentmethodswhich arepresented.  Dr.MahamaneAli DeputyViceChancellorandDeanofFacultyofSciencesandTechnics(FST), UniversityofMaradi,Maradi Niger [...]... maintaining the functions of shallow aquatic ecosystems with bottom-up type trophic dynamics, as it affects the physical, chemical and biological processes of coastal ecosystems worldwide At present, its vulnerability in face of the eutrophication of coastal aquatic ecosystems and the declination or disappearance of populations with the resulting loss of biodiversity are a matter of concern (Wigand et... the case of tropical fluvial wetlands located in Mesoamerica Freshwater ecosystems are rich in species diversity and endemisms, but only a small proportion of species have been assessed in freshwater ecosystems of tropical areas (Lévêque et al., 2005; Dudgeon et al., 2006), including Mesoamerica This lack of biodiversity data for tropical areas becomes critical considering the high rates of extinction... area with a high availability of water resources in the country (Sánchez et al., 2008) This chapter includes a 10 year checklist of macrofauna species associated with V americana, together with an analysis of whether lagoons with a great number of species and high density (org/m2) of fauna, maximum values of quantitative habitat complexity of SAV and a minimum degree of perturbation, present the most... analysis of the spatial and temporal variations of 1) the environmental quality of the water column, 2) the quantitative habitat complexity of V americana, and 3) the abundance and diversity of molluscs, crustaceans and fish 2 Materials and methods 2.1 Study area and habitat The BRPC is a tropical fluvial wetland that covers an area of 302,000 ha, with approximately 110 lentic ecosystems and 2,934.1 km2 of. .. Vallisneria americana shelters a high diversity of macrofauna in the BRPC and other ecosystems (Rozas & Minello, 2006; Sánchez et al., 2012) The spatial and temporal variations of the fauna associated with V americana may be explained by quantitative changes in habitat complexity (Rozas & Minello, 2006) and by the effects of flood pulses on the Macrofaunistic Diversity in Vallisneria americana Michx... temporal variation of the two environmental indices of the 12 Diversity of Ecosystems water (PDI and TSITP) was neutralised by similar opposite values recorded for the two habitat complexity metrics, SAV leaf area and SAV biomass (Figure 1) The increase in the quantitative complexity of the habitat during the maximum flood season is reflected in the increase in the number of species and density of the associated... Sánchez et al (2012) The high number of species associated with V americana that was recorded in this study and other studies carried out in the BRPC (Mendoza-Carranza et al., 2010; Macossay et al., 2011; 14 Diversity of Ecosystems Sánchez et al., 2012) emphasizes the importance of the V americana patches, that occupy less than 1% of the substrate of the permanent aquatic ecosystems (Sánchez et al., 2007)... average plus the standard error in the case of the parameters of which the maximum values represented conditions of environmental alteration (EC, TSS, NH4 and PO4) In contrast, the reference value was estimated with the average minus the standard error in the case of the metric (DOS) of which the minimum value defined conditions of environmental alteration The value of each metric per sampling site (5 metrics... the high number of species that are considered at risk and in the conservation status of the macrofauna itself (Revenga et al., 2005; Dudgeon et al., 2006) The high diversity values that have been recorded for aquatic invertebrates and fish in structured habitats are threatened by the drastic reduction in the surface area of limnetic ecosystems, as has been documented for several areas of the USA (Revenga... El Sauzo with high habitat complexity values and the greatest density of the invasive mollusc Thiara tuberculata, and Chichicastle with low values of habitat complexity Lastly, the lagoon of El Guanal remained separated due to the disappearance of its SAV patch and the resulting absence of macrofauna (Table 3) During the season of maximum floods, three groups were formed (Figure 3) where, in contrast . DIVERSITY OF ECOSYSTEMS EditedbyMahamaneAli DIVERSITY OF ECOSYSTEMS  EditedbyMahamaneAli            Diversity of Ecosystems Edited by Mahamane. regions ecosystems,  the dynamics of grazed ecosystems in arid regions, the primary production of oceanic and terrestrial ecosystems, thedevelopm ent of newtechniqueson ecosystems analysis,thedynamics of . vulnerability in face of the eutrophication of coastal aquatic ecosystems and the declination or disappearance of populations with the resulting loss of biodiversity are a matter of concern (Wigand