With up to 20,000 species of insects throughout Alberta the opportunities for entomological study are immense. An entomological reconnaissance study of the Syncrude Lease #17 area was required to gain preliminary data and to examine the potential of insects as biological monitors of environmental changes resulting from the Syncrude development. In 1974, a three week field reconnaissance study of terrestrial insects occurring on Syncrude Lease #17 and its environs, in the Athabasca Tar Sands of Northern Alberta, was carried out. Various sampling methods were employed in disturbed and undisturbed stands of different boreal forest tree types and in an area cleared of trees for mining purposes. The results obtained suggest that further study of certain insects may give an early indication of possible environmental damage. These insects are a dung beetle, Aphodius sp. (Scarabaeidae: Coleoptera), two species of March flies (Bibionidae : Diptera) and several species of ground beetles (Carabidae : Coleoptera). A future sampling plan can be based on the quantitative (soil sampling) data.
Related Resources
Variability in Flow and Tracer-based Performance Metric Sensitivities Reveal RFegional Differences in Dominant Hydrological Processes Across the Athabasca River Basin
Resource Date:
2022
Groundwater Monitoring Near Oil Sands Development: Insights from Regional Water Quality Datasets in the Alberta Oil Sands Region (AOSR)
Resource Date:
2022
Population Structure of Threatened Caribou in Western Canada Inferred From Genome-wide SNP Data
Resource Date:
October
2022
Association of Environmental Factors with Seasonal Intensity of Erysipelothrix rhusiopathiae Seropositivity among Arctic Caribou
Resource Date:
August
2022
Organization
Was this helpful?
|