New water research from Lund based on nineteen years of data from Skåne Ringsjön. “Gives us a chance to slow the effects of climate change,” according to researcher Pablo Urritia Cordero.
in the mid-1980s, Skåne Ringsjön in a state of disrepair. Decades of eutrophication – mainly from agriculture – had the entire lake ecosystem tipping. The water was brown and thick toxic algae. The natural balance was destroyed.
Several different types of fish have been picked up from the lake, mainly bream, roach and bream. Some are bottenbetare, who with his rooting activates the nutrients which otherwise remained unchanged in the sediments. Other fish that live on chewing itself zooplankton – and thus eliminates the organisms that are toxic algae in check.
Masters student in aquatic ecology Mariana Jáuregui and researcher Pablo Urrutia Cordero at Lund University are working with sampling of the “artificial lakes” that are used to investigate the effects of changes in climate.
– We already know that bio-manipulation in the form of over-fishing helps. What I have now been able to show is that measures can also act as a buffer, a way for the lake to cope with future climate change, says Pablo Urrutia Cordero.
It abounds with lakes in Sweden. But the interplay between temperature, nutrition, plant and animal life works is highly complex. And mix you also into human intervention and the natural temperature changes are causal relationships more difficult to identify.
In this play long data series – as they gathered in Ringsjön – an important role.
– the uniqueness of the data from Ringsjön is that we can see both warm and cold years, both before and after biomanipulationen, says Pablo Urrutia Cordero.
Eutrophication of lakes and water is a major problem worldwide. Algal blooms can make drinking water toxic, and finding effective methods to preserve the ecological balance is thus extremely important.
What research is showing is that the overfishing of certain species means that the lake actually manage both browner water ( another effect of which is partly due to climate change) and higher temperatures.
– If the fish ceases lake will likely return to its previous state. Partly because it fortforande supplied a lot of nutrients from agriculture, partly because the nutrients are stored in the lake. So it will take decades before these substances are gone, says Pablo Urrutia Cordero.
Is bio-manipulation in the form of over-fishing of certain species expensive? Yes and no.
– It costs a lot. But it will be far more expensive to do nothing. When we destroy the resources that we need for drinking water, swimming and fishing.
– Improved quality of such ecosystem services would also benefit the local communities, especially if we find ways to use the biomass caught up in a great way, such as animal feed, says Pablo Urrutia Cordero.
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