Effectiveness assessment of using riverine water eDNA to simultaneously
monitor the riverine and riparian biodiversity information
Abstract
Both aquatic and terrestrial biodiversity information can be detected in
riverine water environmental DNA (eDNA). However, whether riverine water
eDNA can be used to simultaneously monitor aquatic and terrestrial
biodiversity remains unverified. To assess the effectiveness of using
riverine water eDNA to simultaneously monitor the riverine and
terrestrial biodiversity information, we proposed that the monitoring
effectiveness could be approximated by the transportation effectiveness
of land-to-river and upstream-to-downstream biodiversity information
flows. Subsequently, we conducted a case study in a watershed on the
Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The case demonstrated that there was higher
monitoring effectiveness on summer or autumn rainy days than in other
seasons and weather conditions. The monitoring of the bacterial
biodiversity information was more efficient than the monitoring of the
eukaryotic biodiversity information. On summer rainy days, 43-76% of
species information in riparian sites could be detected in water eDNA
samples, 92-99% of species information in riverine sites could be
detected in a 1-km downstream eDNA sample, and half of dead
bioinformation (i.e., the bioinformation labeling the biological
material that lacked life activity and fertility) could be monitored 4-6
km downstream for eukaryotes and 13-19 km downstream for bacteria. In
this case, we tested the eDNA monitoring effectiveness assessment
framework, in which the land-to-river monitoring effectiveness was
indicated by detection probability, and the upstream-to-downstream
monitoring effectiveness was described by the detection probability per
kilometer runoff distance and by the half-life distance of dead
bioinformation. It provided a new and usable tool for designing
monitoring projects and for evaluating monitoring results.