author(s)
Shazia Habib, AR Yousuf

abstract
Understanding the importance of interaction among various biotic-variables is a prerequisite for analyzing the changes in the environment of an ecosystem. In aquatic ecology, macrophytes play a prominent role in providing stable habitat to various other biota including fish, invertebrates, periphytons and diatoms. The composition of these taxonomic groups is a better predictor of assemblage diversity and indicator of the health of the ecosystem, thereby lending importance to species interaction for spatial coherence. Macrophytes and invertebrates are bio-indicators of water quality due to their varying degree of sensitivity to pollution. Unlike chemical data, which provides water quality information at a discrete point in time, the biological organisms are long-term indicators of environmental stressors. Moreover the macroinvertebrates are more effective than chemical methods for detecting non-point source pollution. In part, of the wide-spectrum of taxa-specific responses among these organisms to environmental stressors and long-term response to both exposure and recovery has enhanced there use in biomonitoring. Besides macrophyte morphology plays a decisive role in invertebrate density and diversity by providing a variety of ecological niches. Likewise insect herbivory inflict damage to the structure of macrophytes, thus, both share a two-way relation. Appreciating the essentiality of this association is the key to improvement of aquatic biodiversity that identifies the interactions and understands the pattern of changes in the regional species pool. The present paper is a comprehensive review that highlights the interaction between macrophyte and the associated invertebrate community.