Changes in Fish Communities of Lake Ontario Coastal Wetlands before and after Remedial Action Plans

Table 2

Comparison of habitat quality of 13 wetlands in this study, along with corresponding WQI (Water Quality Index) scores for the recent era and Wetland Fish Index (WFI) scores for both historic and recent periods. Historic sampling effort represents the total number of locations of fishes within 5 km of each site. Difference was calculated by subtracting historic WFI score from the recent value. Numbers below the means are the SE. 𝑃 value is presented for 2-tailed Wilcoxon sign-rank test for WFI score in two time periods. WQI scores should be interpreted as follows: −3 to –2 (highly degraded); −2 to –1 (very degraded); −1 to 0 (moderately degraded); 0 to 1 (good); 1-2 (very good).

						WFI Scores
Wetland name	Site code	Lat	Long	Historic sampling effort	WQI score	Historic	Recent	Difference
Cootes Paradise/Grindstone Creek	A	43.267	−79.917	3	−1.62	2.56	2.50	−0.06
Credit River	B	43.550	−79.580	2	−1.48	3.09	2.57	−0.52
Frenchman's Bay	C	43.812	−79.095	3	−0.53	2.73	2.60	−0.13
Darlington Provincial Park	D	43.873	−78.797	2	−1.16	2.20	2.62	+0.42
Presqu'ile Provincial Park	E	44.000	−77.731	1	0.47	2.00	3.43	+1.43
Wellers Bay	F	44.017	−77.617	1	1.00	3.50	3.42	−0.08
Hay Bay Marsh	G	44.167	−76.933	1	0.45	1.80	3.53	+1.73
Little Cataraqui Creek	H	44.217	−76.550	1	−1.28	3.67	3.44	−0.23
Mud Bay	I	44.067	−76.317	3	−0.72	3.04	3.20	+0.16
Perch River/Muskellunge River	J	43.967	−76.050	2	−0.15	2.79	3.44	+0.65
Sandy Creek	K	43.701	−76.196	2	1.06	3.09	3.38	+0.29
Salmon River	L	43.568	−76.202	2	1.28	3.11	3.65	+0.54
Little Sodus	M	43.339	−76.694	3	0.33	2.73	3.30	+0.57
Mean score					−0.18	2.79	3.16	+0.36
					(0.28)	(0.15)	(0.12)	(0.18)
						𝑃 value	.04