Theses and Dissertations

Issuing Body

Mississippi State University

Advisor

Ervin, Gary

Committee Member

Taylor, M. Christopher

Committee Member

Tietjen, Todd

Date of Degree

8-7-2010

Document Type

Graduate Thesis - Open Access

Major

Biological Sciences

Degree Name

Master of Science

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Department of Biological Sciences

Abstract

The Mobile Basin is a prime example of a system that has undergone extensive channel modification with corresponding declines in the distribution and abundance of the native aquatic fauna. However, many of the declining aquatic species of the Mobile basin may persist within unmodified subbasins. The Noxubee River is a subbasin of the Mobile basin that has had very little alteration throughout its watershed. I investigated the species richness and assemblage structure to determine if the contemporary fish assemblage attributes resembled the conditions represented by historic collections. The findings of this study are important because the Noxubee River has not been extensively investigated since 1983, and the river could serve as refugia for declining riverine species of the Mobile basin. After examination at both local and regional levels, I determined that a diverse contemporary fish assemblage comprising 87 species, similar to historic collections, still persists in the Noxubee River system.

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11668/15223

Comments

Tombigbee River||Noxubee River||Fish Diversity||Fish Conservation||Mobile Basin

Download

Share

COinS