Water Air Soil Pollut (2007) 186:233–254
DOI 10.1007/s11270-007-9480-3
Effects of Long-Term Heavy Metal Contamination
on Diversity of Terricolous Fungi and Nematodes
in Egypt - A Case Study
A. M. Abdel-Azeem & T. S. Abdel-Moneim &
M. E. Ibrahim & M. A. A. Hassan & M. Y. Saleh
Received: 8 February 2007 / Accepted: 22 July 2007 / Published online: 13 September 2007
# Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2007
Abstract Internationally there is a gradual decline in
availability of fresh water to be used for irrigation. As a
consequence, the use of drain water for irrigating
agricultural lands is on the rise particularly in urban
areas of developing countries especially Egypt. On the
other hand, there is increasing concern regarding the
exceedance of statutory and advisory food standards for
trace metals throughout the world. A study was
A. M. Abdel-Azeem (*)
Department of Botany, Faculty of Science,
Suez Canal University,
Ismailia 41522, Egypt
e-mail: zemo3000@yahoo.com
T. S. Abdel-Moneim
Department of Agricultural Botany,
Faculty of Agriculture, Suez Canal University,
Ismailia 41522, Egypt
M. E. Ibrahim
Department of Geological and Biological Sciences,
Faculty of Education, Suez Canal University,
Al-Arish, Egypt
M. A. A. Hassan
Department of Soil and Water,
Faculty of Agriculture, Suez Canal University,
Ismailia 41522, Egypt
M. Y. Saleh
Department of Civil Engineering,
Faculty of Engineering, Suez Canal University,
Port Said, Egypt
undertaken to assess the long-term effect of irrigation
with drain water on heavy metal content in soils and
diversity of terricolous biota. An agroecosystem in Bahr
El-Baqar area, south of Port Said, Egypt were selected
where various cereals, vegetable and fodder crops have
successfully been grown. During the period from
September (2004) to February (2005), 25 soil profiles,
100 soil and 30 water samples were collected from
cultivated soil and drain of Bahr El-Baqar. Soil heavy
metals content (Zn, Pb, Cd, Co, Mn and Cu), gypsum,
organic matter, total calcium carbonates, cations, anions,
electric conductivity and pH were determined. Water
samples has been subjected to various analyses includ-
ing water temperature, pH, total soluble salts, electric
conductivity, total nitrogen, total phosphate, heavy
metals and organic loads (chemical oxygen demand
and biological oxygen demand). For isolation and
examination of total mycobiota, arbuscular-mycorrhizal
fungi (AMF) and nematodes from rhizosphere soils,
samples were collected from dominant plant species in
the study area. Obtained data were subjected to
multivariate analysis by using Canonical Correspon-
dence Analysis to find out the relationship between
biota and environmental variables. Results indicated
that concentrations of heavy metals exceeded the
maximum allowable limits while water analyses showed
that organic load values are slightly increase in all
examined samples and samples were not complying
with the standard value given by law 48/1982 for
ambient water quality in the drain. It was possible to