The rivers and streams of El Yunque provide aquatic habitats for organisms that are important elements of the forest’s biological diversity, including: seven species of fish, nine species of freshwater shrimp, and 1 species of freshwater crab.
Stream invertebrates are important year- round consumers of forest leaf litter and operate as miniature water treatment plants.
All of these species can be commonly found in any of the rivers or streams of the forest, but they are particularly easy to spot in the Mameyes River (Angelito Trail, Puente Roto, La Coca Trail). The Mameyes River is the only river in the Island that runs un-interrupted from its origin to the sea. Therefore the Mameyes system enjoys the highest natural aquatic diversity and species richness of any Forest watershed. Please visit our website here for full descriptions of all species:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/elyunque/learning/nature-science/?cid=fsbdev3_042978