Authors: Kaj SandJensen Peter A Staehr
Publish Date: 2007/02/13
Volume: 10, Issue: 1, Pages: 128-142
Abstract
We tested whether pelagic light and nutrient availability metabolism organic pools and CO2supersaturation were related to lake size and surrounding forest cover in late summer–autumn measurements among 64 small 002–20 ha shallow seepage lakes located in nutrientrich calcareous moraine soils in North Zealand Denmark We found a strong implicit scaling to lake size as light availability increased significantly with lake size while nutrient availability phytoplankton biomass and dissolved organic matter declined Forest lakes had significantly stronger net heterotrophic traits than open lakes as higher values were observed for light attenuation above and in the water dissolved organic matter pelagic community respiration R relative to maximum gross primary production R/GPP and CO2supersaturation Totalphosphorus was the main predictor of phytoplankton biomass Chl despite a much weaker relationship than observed in previous studies of larger lakes Maximum gross primary production increased with algal biomass and decreased with dissolved organic matter whereas community respiration increased with dissolved organic matter and particularly with gross primary production These results suggest that exogenous organic matter supplements primary production as an energy source to heterotrophs in these small lakes and particularly so in forest lakes experiencing substantial shading from the forest and dissolved humic material This suggestion is supported by 20–30fold CO2 supersaturation in the surface water of the smallest forest lakes and more than sixfold supersaturation in 75 of all measurements making these lakes among the most supersaturated temperate lakes examined so far
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