1. Why investigate sediments when assessing aquatic ecosystems
David Sharley Simon Sharp and
Dan MacMahon
CAPIM Research Summit
August 2016

2. Sediments in aquatic ecosystems
Sediments provide habitat, sources of food, nutrient cycling and microbial decomposition
Riparian habitat
Healthy Ecosystems
Sediment quality
Water quality
Hydrology
Biodiversity
Instream habitat

3. Sediments are sinks for pollutants
Sediments strongly bind many pollutants
can carry high pollutant load
Depend on binding ability
differs between compounds and depends on organic content of sediment
Organic contaminants tend to bind more strongly to sediments

4. Sediments as a pollution monitoring tool
Sediments can accumulate pollutants over time
Provide opportunities to develop long-term trends in pollution
Identify pollution Hotspots along waterways
Develop sediment-based ecotoxicity assessment tools

5. Sediment pollution trends

7. Heavy metal
pollution

9. Sharley, D. J. , Sharp, S. M. , Bourgues, S. , Pettigrove, V. 2016
Sharley, D.J., Sharp, S.M., Bourgues, S., Pettigrove, V Detecting long-term temporal trends in sediment-bound trace metals from urbanised catchments. Environmental Pollution In Press.

10. Population change
Sharley, D.J., Sharp, S.M., Bourgues, S., Pettigrove, V Detecting long-term temporal trends in sediment-bound trace metals from urbanised catchments. Environmental Pollution In Press.

12. Assessing catchments using a multiple lines of evidence approach

13. Measuring ecological condition
Benthic structure
Chemistry
Habitat
hydrology
More specific / causal
Molecular, Biochemical
Community
Population
Individual
Physiological
Ecosystem
More ecologically relevant
Toxicology
Isolating chemistry
Impacts on biota
Biomarkers
Links to chemical
exposure to biota

14. Metals (PECQ)
Herbicides
Insecticides
Fungicides

15. Amphipod toxicity results
Q. Lang
Amphipod toxicity results
Termite protection applied in new housing developments is the likely source of bifenthrin at this site

16. Chironomus tepperi survival
Chinamens Creek
Chironomus tepperi development (emergence)
Chinamens Creek

17. Synthetic pyrethroids
Emerging urban issue
Highly toxic to insects and fish but low mammalian toxicity
Hydrophobic (stick to sediments)
Widespread use
Domestic flea powders
Domestic garden pest control
Infrastructure termite control (new urban developments)

18. Using sediment monitoring data to identify catchment issues
Prioritise management actions
Chinaman Creek

19. Chinaman’s Creek sediment Sampling

20. Further sediment sampling

21. Further drain investigations

22. Macroinvertebrate sampling and identification
Acknowledgements
funding and support
Melbourne Water
EPA Victoria
DEWLP
Local Government
School of BioSciences - Unimelb
Everyone at CAPIM
Field collections
Ecotoxicology
Macroinvertebrate sampling and identification