Krolenko I.I., Mityaeva K.Yu., Neretina A.N., Garibian P.G., Petrovskiy A.B., Kotov A.A.* 2025. Biodiversity of specially protected and unprotected urban water bodies: case of the water fleas (Crustacea: Cladocera) of Moscow City (Russia) // Arthropoda Selecta. Vol.34. No.3: 327–338 [in English].
A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Leninsky Prospect 33, Moscow 119071 Russia.
* Corresponding author
Ivan Krolenko krolenko@gmail.com; https://orcid.org/0009-0006-7152-9608
Kristina Mityaeva kris.mityaeva.2006@mail.ru; https://orcid.org/0009-0001-0522-4930
Anna Neretina neretina-anna@yandex.ru; https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6876-079X
Petr Garibian petr.garibyan21@mail.ru; https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4505-3133
Andrey Petrovskiy a.petrovskiy@sev-in.ru; https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1866-1379
Alexey Kotov alexey-a-kotov@yandex.ru; https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8863-6438
doi: 10.15298/arthsel.34.3.04
ABSTRACT. We analysed zooplankton samples collected in small water bodies in the territory of “Old Moscow” in autumn months of 2020 and 2021; also, additional material from collections dating back to 1998 was examined. Of the 148 studied water bodies, at the time of sampling, 70 were located within the boundaries of the specially protected natural areas of the city, 78 were located outside them. A total of 47 species of water fleas (Crustacea: Cladocera) were identified, 40 species were found in unprotected and 40 — in protected water bodies. The fauna of both protected and unprotected areas demonstrates a high similarity, while the number of species per water body for protected areas is significantly higher. Especially remarkable is absence of a correlation between the species richness and water body size in unprotected area; in contrast, such correlation is significant in protected areas. We propose a “lottery model” to explain a paradoxical situation of correlation absence between species diversity and the surface area in unprotected water bodies.
KEY WORDS: urban ecology, species list analysis, zooplankton, Europe.
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