Over the next year, Wits master’s student Siphelele Mbangata will examine exactly just how polluted the Westdene Spruit that flows within the Melville Koppies is, and with what.
Through her work she is trying to bring to light how the increase in human population impacts on the environment through pollution, which affects the ecosystems, such as urban streams. “Not only do ecosystems benefit plants and animals but also us, as human beings, through things like recreational, and clean water supply.”
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She added if we lose them, or they are not well maintained, we run the risk of losing some plants and animals that play an important role in these ecosystems – in addition to being exposed to toxins, which may pose a threat to our health.
Mbangata, who is doing her master’s in ecology, said she chose her current field of study because while growing up in a village there isn’t much knowledge on wildlife or nature. “However, I was lucky to gain such knowledge from television, where I got to understand that there is so much more that wildlife or nature offers in keeping our world at balance and that everything is interconnected.”
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She added that by studying ecosystems, and the animals that live there, helps her gauge what management strategies one can come up with to make sure that we minimise the chances of driving things to extinction.
Her entire study will focus on intermittent rivers and streams in the Kruger National Park, where she will look at the impact of seasonal flow on macroinvertebrates during the dry and wet season. For her, the environment and its conservation is important as she believes environs to be valuable in and of themselves. Therefore, they deserve to be preserved at all costs because by doing so, all the ecological services they offer will continue for generations.
Mbangata’s first testing of the Westdene Spruit was at the beginning of August. “It is important to find out which toxins affect the water because once the water is contaminated, it tends to lose the normal or acceptable ranges of water quality parameters such as the pH or oxygen which are required by the animals/plants that rely on the stream for survival.”
She added that when these parameters change because of contamination, they end up being a threat to the biota that is dependent on the stream.
As she is all about conservation, her plan is to continue to run these tests until a way is found to prevent the stream from being affected by littering. Ultimately, her hopes are that her findings will bring awareness to the community on how littering is actually affecting the stream’s water quality.
“I hope the community can come together in keeping the stream clean, because when it comes to the environment we need to work together to make sure that we keep it intact and educate the young people on the importance of preserving biodiversity.”
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