Composição funcional e variação espaço- temporal da assembleia de macrófitas aquáticas do reservatório da Usina Hidrlétrica Luís Eduardo Magalhães (Tocantins)

Abstract

Aquatic plants are vegetables that represent great importance in aquatic ecosystems, of which we can mention, production of a large amount of biomass that influences the dynamics of ecosystems; morphological complexity, which provides habitat variability for a diversity of species; physical structure of the environment, used by several aquatic animals. Studies that deal with the contribution of functional diversity in the composition and structuring of the aquatic plant assembly, have been addressed in different studies. There are numerous ways to analyze the functional diversity of an assembly, the most common of which is precisely adopted in the present study, and refers to the recognition of the number of functional groups, closely associated with the richness of species and the composition of the community. The present study was carried out in four tributaries of the Luís Eduardo Magalhães Hydroelectric Power Plant reservoir, in the State of Tocantins (Areias, Mangues, Santa Luzia and Água Suja) and a stretch located between the fluvial and intermediate region of the main body of the Tocantins River, in the municipality of Porto Nacional. Seven functional traits were chosen, which strongly influence the performance of an organism in terms of growth, survival and reproduction. Through the functional dendrogram, 14 functional groups were recognized, with the biological form and the type of reproduction the attributes that most contributed to the definition of the functional groups. Through the results achieved, it was clearly verified that by identifying the functional relationships shared by the species, it is possible to better understand what the ecosystem functions, and how the variation in the characteristics of the species influence this functioning.