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Urbanization negatively impacts the diversity of aquatic insect assemblages in headwater streams and can lead to the homogenization of insect communities at the regional level. However, less is known about the impact of urbanization on insects in headwater streams within smaller cities that have significant upstream portions outside of urban land use. We collected insects monthly from April to September in 2014 and 2015 from five streams that flowed from rural upstream through urban downstream land use, plus two rural reference streams, in Greater Binghamton, New York, in the northeast USA. While urbanization was associated with lower insect taxonomic richness ( α ¯ ) and elevated stream water conductivity, the regional diversity (γ) was similar among urban and rural land use. This corresponded to higher dissimilarity among urban sites (β) than among rural sites. To our knowledge, this is the first report of higher urban stream insect community β-diversity. Our results suggest that urbanization in this medium-sized city negatively impacts stream insect richness, but the change of community assemblages is not homogenous across the urban landscape. Connectivity between upstream rural sites and downstream urban sites may provide some relief from the impacts of urbanization in smaller cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since wetland construction projects are becoming more commonplace, meaningful follow-up studies are needed to evaluate how these systems change over time. To that end, the objective of our study was to examine the temporal changes in plant community composition and water chemistry in two constructed wetlands. We investigated two wetland sites that were constructed in 2003 in northern Otsego County, NY, a county that is largely dominated by agriculture. Site 1 was previously an active cow pasture and site 2 was previously a wet meadow surrounded by agricultural fields. No active plant introduction was made during the construction; however, both sites were located in areas with many remnant wetlands and were connected to through-flowing streams. In 2004 (Year 1) and 2010 (Year 7), the plant community composition and nitrogen retention were assessed. We found that both sites experienced site-wide declines in plant species richness, including the loss of upland and facultative upland species and the unanticipated loss of facultative wetland and some obligate species. We propose that high water levels, which, at their maximum depth were >1.5 m deeper than in Year 1, maintained by landowners in the years after the initial survey, may have been responsible for the unexpected loss of wetland species. We also found that site 1 exhibited considerable nitrogen retention in both Year 1 and Year 7; however, N concentrations were low at site 2 in both years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Constructed wetlands are increasingly being used to treat wastewater, yet most remediation studies only focus on single pollutants (e.g. nitrogen [N] or phosphorus [P]) or pollutant classes (e.g. nutrients). For wetland remediation to be useful in urban systems, where storm generated wastewater often contains many different pollutant types (e.g. nutrients and metals), wetlands must be able to both tolerate and remediate these pollutant cocktails. Since plants are often integral to this treatment ability, the objective of our study was to evaluate the growth of three common wetland plants (Glyceria grandis, Typha latifolia and Sagittaria latifolia) treated with single and multi-pollutant wastewater types. We planted six replicate blocks within the research greenhouse at Binghamton University located in Binghamton, NY, USA. Each block contained 12 five-gallon pots filled with homogenized wetland sediment collected from a natural wetland on campus. Four pots were planted with G. grandis, four with T. latifolia and four with S. latifolia. Plants from each of the three species were assigned with one of four treatment solutions (dionized water [control], nitrate [NO3 −], metal mixture [Zn, Cu, Pb, Cd], or nitrate and metal mixture), and watered weekly for a total of seven weeks. Effluent was collected weekly and analyzed to determine weekly NO3–N efflux. At peak standing biomass, all roots and shoots were harvested to determine total aboveground and belowground biomass and N and P accumulation. Sediment was also collected to determine net N mineralization rates. We found that the NO3 − treatment, metal treatment and the combined NO3 − and metal treatment had no negative effect on plant growth and nutrient (N and P) content. However, G. grandis produced a greater amount of aboveground biomass (33.09±0.72g) and had a greater amount of N (450.9±25.3mg) in the aboveground biomass than T. latifolia (22.25±1.54g; 300.0±21.8mg) and S. latifolia (24.30±1.53g; 297.1±21.3mg). While S. latifolia sequestered a greater amount of P (181.6±11.1mg) than G. grandis (127.6±8.6mg) and T. latifolia (97.1±8.9mg). In addition, efflux NO3–N was substantially reduced by both plants and sediment, but plant presence caused a significantly greater NO3–N reduction than sediment alone. These findings indicate that wetland plants can grow well under single and multi-pollutant conditions, like those commonly found in urban systems, and that optimal ecosystem function would more likely occur in systems with multiple plant species assemblages. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]