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The objective of this study was to develop an index of biological integrity (IBI) for national-level monitoring of watersheds as an ecosystem health assessment methodology for the South Korean government. A 10-metric IBI model (IBIKW) was developed for watershed management and then applied to 76 streams in four major watersheds in Korea. The model assessments showed that 32.9% of all streams were judged to be in ‘excellent-good’ condition, whereas 67.1% were in ‘fair-poor’ condition, indicating severely impaired ecological health. Nutrient analyses of stream water revealed a two- to fivefold increase in nutrient and biological oxygen demand (BOD) levels in urban- and cropland-dominant streams compared to forest- dominant streams. The guild structure within the watersheds indicated that tolerant species were predominant in severely degraded regions (BOD>6 mg/L), and sensitive species were distributed in regions with BOD<2 mg/L. Factors affecting ecosystem health (IBIKW scores) included chemical water quality parameters, physical habitat parameters and land use around the stream. In particular, land use was one of the major factors influencing ecosystem health, as indicated by the strong relationships between the percentages of urban and forest streams and the IBIKW scores. The integrated ecosystem health assessment technique developed here can be applied for both regular bioassessments and post-restoration assessments.
