~ I ~ J Life Science Journal, 3 (4), 2006, Sharma, et al, Water Quality Assessment of Behta River .. I J f J J " f J ) ) ~ ) ) I 4 ) j ) j 1J .... Water Quality Assessment of Behta River Using Benthic Macroinvertebrates Mahendra Pal Sharma, Shailendra Sharma, Vivek Gael, Praveen Sharma, Arun Kumar Alternate Hydro Energy untre, Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee 247667, Uttaranchal Abstract:Aquatic macroinvertebrates play significant role in responding to a variety of environmental conditions of rivers and streams and therefore may be used as bio-indicators for water quality assessment. In the past, biological communities like plankton, periphyton, microphytobenthos, macrozoobenthos, aquatic macrophytes, fishes etc. have been used for the assessment of water quality of rivers and streams, but now the use of benthic macroinverte- brates as bio-indicators is gaining importance as these can be easily caught and seen with naked eyes and the method is less costlier and less time consuming compared to other methods given above. Behta River of Paonta Sahib in Hi- machal Pradesh was chosen to assess the suitability of river water for drinking purposes. The present study involved sampling, pre-identification and identification of macroinvertebrates and computing the percent of occurrence of families of various taxonomic groups and conducting physico-chemical analysis of samples from selected location. Macroinvertebrates chosen were identified up to family level, and bio-assessment at various locations has been done using NEPBIOS score system. It was found that out of total 30 genus belonging to 10 families of taxonomical group like Ephemeroptera, Trichoptera, Plecoptera, Coleoptera, Heteroptera, Odonata, Diptera Mollusca, Oligochaetes etc. have been found in different composition inhabiting the river. The results further show that all the locations assessed for quality using macroinvertebrates and physico-chemical analysis are in the range of water quality class ill (Moderately Polluted) and the water can not be used for drinking purposes. The measures tOcreduce point and non-point sources of pollution have been suggested to get the quality suitable for drinking purposeS. {Life Science Journal. 2006;3(4) :68 -74] (ISSN: 1097 - 8135). ) , J ) J i J l J Keywords: benthic macroinvertebrates; indicators; NEPBIOS; NSF water quality index Abbreviations: NSF: National Sanitation Foundation; NEPBIOS: Nepalese Biotic Score; WQI:water quality in- dex; APHA: American Public Health Association; ASPT: average score per taxon; BOD: biochemical o~ygen de- mand; DO: dissolved oxygen; NTU: nephelometric turbidity unit; U/S: upstream; D/S: downstream 1 Introduction ~ Aquatic macroinvertebrates play significant role in responding to a variety of environmental conditions of rivers and streams and therefore may be used as bio-indicators for water quality assess- ment. Benthic macroinvertebrates are the animals that lack a back-bone and generally are visible with the naked eyes. They live in the lower areas of the streams under rocks. They include larval forms of many common insects such as Dragon flies, Damsel flies and Crane flies. Common features of these are as follows: * Live in water for all or most of their life. Often live for more than one year. * Stay in the area suitable for their survival. * Differ in their tolerance to amount and types of pollution. * Are easy to identify in the laboratory. * Have limited mobility. Macro-invertebrate community responses to environmental changes are useful in assessing the -J impact of municipal, industrial and agricJlltural waste and impacts from other land uses on surface water. The macroinvertebrates are highly popular as pollution indicators[l] . Benthic organisms are of gteat significance be- cause they form the food of fishes and their produc- tivity play an important link in the food chain. Benthic organisms are distrivores and form an im- portant link in the food chain, an account of their ability to convert low quality and low energy detri- tus into better quality food for higher organisms in the food web with the unfolding of the importance of benthos in food chain, benthic productivity has been correlated with fish resources. The qualitative and quantitative changes in the benthic population have also been used as pollution indices[2-4]. Benthic macroinvertebrates are aquatic macro- fauna inhibiting the bottom substrate for at least a part of their life cycle. The reason of selecting macroinvertebrates as bio-indicators is that they are visible to unaided eyes and retained on the sieve with a mesh sized of 0.6 mm diameter. They have J J ~ I ) J I J J .... ,J J I J J J J J L ,. i ~ J <I .J J . 68 . J J J J