In a floodplain lake of the Amazon River near the city of Iquitos, northeastern Peru, a one-year monitoring experiment was conducted during which water samples and living bivalves (Anodontites trapesialis) were collected with the aim to investigate seasonal δ18O variation in and fractionation between bivalve aragonite and host water. Both host water and molluscan growth increments show more than 8‰ seasonal variation in δ18O. In the floodplain lake under study the δ18O variation of the water is controlled by contrasting dry and wet season evaporation-precipitation regimes. Molluscan δ18O appears to be in equilibrium with the host water. Although an approximately 4.0‰ offset occurs, δ13C records of water and bivalves are in good agreement, suggesting that both δ18O and δ13C of the shells of freshwater bivalve A. trapesialis are good recorders of (palaeo-)environmental conditions. The δ13C of Dissolved Inorganic Carbon (DIC) is governed by plant growth and/or by changes in aquatic chemistry, affecting the DIC pool. © 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.