Environmental flows and tributary inflows differently stimulate bacterial production in a regulated river

River regulation has globally greatly impacted the natural flow regime of many major rivers, resulting in detrimental changes to water chemistry and ecology. Environmental flows (e-flows) are legislated in many countries to improve the ecological health of regulated river systems, however their impacts on planktonic microbial community structure and metabolic function are poorly understood. To assess the impact of e-flows on instream bacterial metabolism and microbial community composition, the Macquarie-Wambuul River in the Murray-Darling Basin of eastern Australia was sampled frequently during a dam release e-flow and a tributary inflow.