USING LANDSCAPE VARIABLES FOR ASSESSING STREAM HEALTH IN SOUTHEASTERN OHIO

For twenty years the Ohio EPA has characterized stream health using fish and macroinvertebrate community assemblages, as well as by local habitat within the stream. Since the adjoining landscape may also influence stream health, this research explores a variety of easily attainable GIS land use/cover, population, and forest fragmentation data to find which best correlate with stream health. Four different metrics (percent native fish, darters/sculpins, intolerant, and sensitive species) were evaluated against forty-four different independent variables using multiple regression. Three variables were important for predicting stream health: density of abandoned mine openings in the upstream catchment, forest connectivity in a 66 ha area surrounding the sample point, and percent wetlands (from NLCD) within the HUC-14 subwatershed. Percent forest cover (GIRAS) in the upstream riparian buffer was also important for sensitive species. Despite known macro- and micro-controls on fish communities, landscape variables were able to explain up to half the variance in these fish metrics.