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dc.contributor.advisorKirkwood, Andrea
dc.contributor.authorNarini, Massimo
dc.date.accessioned2017-03-17T18:50:54Z
dc.date.accessioned2022-03-29T17:34:03Z
dc.date.available2017-03-17T18:50:54Z
dc.date.available2022-03-29T17:34:03Z
dc.date.issued2016-07-01
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10155/723
dc.description.abstractThe Nottawasaga Valley Watershed (NVW) is a large catchment south of Georgian Bay that drains a primarily agricultural region including one of the largest wetland complexes in Southern Ontario, the Minesing Wetlands (MW). The MW are designated both provincially and internationally significant due to its large area and high biological diversity. Agricultural practices have been a large influence on the Nottawasaga River ecosystem throughout history, but intensification of agricultural demands have put stress on surface water quality across the river network. In order to understand how ecosystem health may be impacted from current agricultural land-use, baseline water quality and phytoplankton data were collected monthly (June-September 2014) over 15 sites across the Nottawasaga River continuum. In addition, first- and second-order streams directly influenced by agricultural land-use runoff were assessed for impacts to surface water quality and periphyton biomass across the NVW. Water quality across the Nottawasaga River exhibited large amounts of variation, with Innisfil Creek having a disproportional influence on suspended sediment related impacts to water quality. Agricultural and urban land-use were positively correlated with many water quality parameters, whereas natural land-use features (i.e. forest, water and wetland land-use) were negatively correlated with many water quality parameters. Principal components analysis revealed that sites upstream of the MW exhibited higher values associated with nutrients and suspended sediments, while those downstream of it exhibited higher values associated with decreased riparian vegetation. Redundancy analysis reinforced that upstream sites are highly influenced by urban and agricultural land-use, linking these to impacted water quality. Algal community structure and biomass were variable, but consistently were maintained at oligotrophic levels, dominated by pollution tolerant bioindicator taxa. Water quality of the low order streams across the NVW was highly variable, with differences in multiple water quality parameters found even when agricultural type was the same. Many of the sites had high concentrations of nutrients linked with agricultural land-use, but limited statistically significant relationships could be attributed to the different agricultural types. Water quality variation was important in describing the variation in fatty acid composition of periphyton biomass, as described by redundancy analysis. Total chlorophyll content was directly linked with increases in certain fatty acid proportions, some of which can be classified as essential fatty acids.en
dc.description.sponsorshipUniversity of Ontario Institute of Technologyen
dc.language.isoenen
dc.subjectLand-useen
dc.subjectWater qualityen
dc.subjectPhytoplanktonen
dc.subjectPeriphytonen
dc.subjectNottawasaga Riveren
dc.titleAn investigation of land-use impacts on water quality and algal communities in the Nottawasaga River and low-order streams of the Nottawasaga Valley Watersheden
dc.typeThesisen
dc.degree.levelMaster of Science (MSc)en
dc.degree.disciplineApplied Bioscienceen


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