An index to assess the habitat quality in Southern Coastal Fringe of the Río de la Plata and its relations with other environmental indicators

Evaluating the coastal environment is a necessary task to assess the ecological status of water bodies, which allows to determine the merits of management programs, anthropogenic impacts, or to detect early signs of environmental impacts. To this purpose, the objective of this research was to develop a methodology to assess the habitat quality in the Franja Costera Sur of the Río de la Plata (Argentina). The information obtained from 21 sampling sites, visited from 2005 to 2008, is summarized and simplified in an index, named the Habitat Index for the Río de la Plata (IHRPlata). To obtain the index four separate descriptors are to be evaluated: 1) the spatial succession of the vegetation, 2) any man-introduced infrastructures in the coast, 3) the presence of litter and debris in the coastline, and 4) the visualization of biological indicators that imply oxygen deficit. According to the obtained values for the IHRPlata, 32 percent of the analyzed cases revealed a very good habitat quality, 20 percent good, 24percent moderate, 18 percent bad and 6 percent very bad habitat quality. The obtained values were also significantly correlated with parameters related to water quality and to biotic indicators, which strengthens its usefulness to evaluate the coastal habitat.