Evaluation of Water Quality Based on Macrozoobenthos as Bioindicator in Ngesong Spring and The Ditch, Batu-East Java

Abstract

The Ngesong spring is a clean spring that is used by society as a spring of clean water and as a tourist attraction. The Ngesong spring has a ditch that flows up to the society settlement, where the water is used for agricultural irrigation and plantation irrigation. The utilization of the Ngesong spring as a tourist attraction and its ditch through agriculture, settlements, and society settlements have great potential to cause pollution and degradation of water quality, so it is necessary to evaluate water quality. Therefore, it is necessary to monitor the quality of this water, one of which is using the macrozoobenthos community structure as a bioindicator. The research was conducted in four locations, namely a water spring and the channels that will be used for agriculture, plantations, and settlement activities, in September and October 2022. The variables observed in this study include the physicochemical quality of water, namely water temperature, conductivity, power of hydrogen (pH), dissolved oxygen (DO), biological oxygen demand (BOD), and total suspended solids (TSS), as well as community structure and macrozoobenthos diversity. The results of this study indicate that there are 26 macrozoobenthos families belonging to 12 orders, for a total of 968 individuals. Water springs are the location with the highest diversity and evenness index values, with H = 2.27 and E = 0.54. The results of the analysis of macrozoobenthos family relationships as an indicator of water quality using the Family Biotic Index (FBI) and Average Score Per Taxon (ASPT) showed that the Waterspring site has very clean waters and no organic pollution. At Waterspring sites that have good water quality, the families Perlidae, Nemouridae, Limnephilidae, Viviparidae, Chironomidae, and Euphaeidae were found. Meanwhile, according to the FBI, sites that have highly organically polluted waters are the ditches that had agricultural activity and, based on ASPT, settlement activity.