Data were collected through questionnaire interviews and Focus Group Discussion (FGD). Notun Khoyertola, Puratan Koshba Kazipara, Nodagram, Santola, Nurnagar and Bijoy Nagar Villages in Jashore district to identify the causes for drying up of the Bhairab River so that the flow of the river can be continued and kept alive by taking necessary steps. The study was conducted for a period of four months at six selected drying up points of the Bhairab River, viz. Put value in Dry Rivers as non-perennial rivers with their own ecological identity with significant roles in the landscape, biodiversity and nutrient cycles, and society thus worthy to be considered, especially in the face of exacerbated hydrological drying in many rivers across the world.īhairab River is an important river in the moribund delta area of Bangladesh although it is drying up gradually. Finally, we drew main conclusions where major knowledge gaps and research needs are also outlined. We applied an integrative approach that incorporates to the limnological perspective the terrestrial view, useful to gain a better understanding of Dry Rivers. We explored the capacity of Dry Rivers to provide ecosystem services and described main aspects of anthropogenic threats, management challenges and the conservation of these ecosystems. Secondly, we analyzed existing knowledge on distribution, geophysical and hydrological features, biota and biogeochemical attributes that characterize Dry Rivers.
We firstly reviewed the variety of definitions used to refer to these non-perennial rivers featured by a predominant dry phase with This paper aims to show that Dry Rivers are ecosystems in their own right given their distinct structural and functional characteristics compared to other non-perennial rivers due to prevalence of terrestrial conditions.
Conceptually, Dry Rivers would represent the extreme of the hydrological continuum of increased flow interruption that typically characterizes the non-perennial rivers, thus being preceded by intermittent and ephemeral rivers that usually support longer wet phases, respectively. Where surface water may interrupt dry conditions for hours or a few days, primarily after heavy rainfall events that are variable in time and that usually lead to flash floods, disconnected from groundwater and thereby unable to harbor aquatic life. We define Dry Rivers as those whose usual habitat in space and time are dry channels