Abstract Rivers shape the landscape and determine spatial connectivity for a variety of riverine and terrestrial organisms. Rivers impacted by human disturbances are often in need of restoration in order to increase their functionality and ecological diversity, and ultimately to improve the ecosystems services that they offer. Because it is usually assumed that physical diversity of river systems promotes biological diversity or riverine species, river restoration practices often tend to enhance simplified rivers by increasing structural morphological complexity of river reaches. However, the relationship between the variability of physical features and the biological communities in riverine environments is not necessarily straightforward to assume due to the high degree of complexity and feedback in the relationship. This work presents a case study with the application of a recent geomorphological method developed in Europe for the assessment and characterization of geomorphic conditions in combination with biological surveys, along a mountain river basin in Central Chile (Clarillo River). Although representing a single “snapshot” in the pulsating nature of a river system, our results suggest that availability of habitats provides the conditions to support different levels of biodiversity in a hierarchical way in terms of spatial scale. In particular, we found that abundance and diversity of macroinvertebrates are more related with composition of geomorphic units, whereas the presence of fish is more related with the geomorphic nature of the reaches, and the presence of anurans is more related with the geomorphic nature of river segments.

中文翻译：

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空间尺度决定了形态多样性与河流生物多样性的关系。来自智利安第斯山脉中部山区河流的证据

摘要 河流塑造了景观，并决定了各种河流和陆地生物的空间连通性。受人类干扰影响的河流通常需要修复，以增加其功能和生态多样性，并最终改善其提供的生态系统服务。因为通常假设河流系统的物理多样性促进了生物多样性或河流物种，河流恢复实践往往倾向于通过增加河段结构形态的复杂性来增强简化河流。然而，由于关系的高度复杂性和反馈，物理特征的可变性与河流环境中的生物群落之间的关系不一定直接假设。这项工作介绍了一个案例研究，其中应用了欧洲开发的最新地貌学方法，结合生物调查，在智利中部（克拉里洛河）沿山河流域评估和表征地貌条件。尽管代表了河流系统脉动性质的单一“快照”，但我们的结果表明，栖息地的可用性提供了在空间尺度上以分层方式支持不同水平生物多样性的条件。特别是，我们发现大型无脊椎动物的丰度和多样性与地貌单位的组成更相关，而鱼类的存在与河段的地貌性质更相关，无尾类的存在与河流的地貌性质更相关。段。