Like a fish takes to water: Minimum discharge requirements to sustain rheophilic fish community dominance in bypassed river reaches

Hydropower production leads to losses of species and ecosystem types in rivers. A major knowledge gap is represented by bypassed reaches where all or most discharge is diverted to hydropower stations. Bypassed reaches may have some flow, derived from tributaries and dam leakage, along with minimum flow. In Sweden, mandates for minimum discharge are lacking for most bypassed reaches, and when present, generally amount to only a few percent of mean annual discharge. We asked how fish communities in bypassed reaches differ from comparable non-regulated reference reaches, and whether minimum discharge can help sustain fish faunas typical of non-regulated rivers. We assembled a unique dataset of 2693 samples collected via electrofishing by wading from 166 bypassed reaches and 247 free-flowing reaches spread across Sweden. To quantify flow-related community changes, we compared the relative dominance of rheophilic (preference for high flow conditions) versus limnophilic (preference for slow-f..., , # Data from: Like a fish takes to water: Minimum discharge requirements to sustain rheophilic fish community dominance in bypassed river reaches

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.cjsxksnkn](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.cjsxksnkn)

## Description of the data and file structure

This dataset contains data on river reaches in Sweden that have been sampled using electrofishing, encompassing bypassed reaches affected by hydropower and unregulated reference reaches. 

### Files and variables

#### File: variable_explanation.csv

**Description:** This file explains the nature of the data in the columns in the data_file

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#### File: data_file.csv

**Description:** This file contains the data described in the variable_explanation file. Note that comma is used as decimal delimiter.
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