DATE2019-01-08 12:44:22
IDABSTRACT2014/111
CONTACTeti@thelevis.com
PRESENTATIONORAL
INVITED0
IDSESSION1
TITLEEFFECT OF WATER LEVEL CHANGE ON BENTHIC-PELAGIC EXCHANGE IN THREE TURKISH SHALLOW LAKES: A PALEOLIMNOLOGICAL APPROACH
AUTHORSEti Ester Levi (1)|Gizem Bezirci (1)|Ayşe İdil Çakıroğlu (1)|Simon Turner (2)|Lisa Skov Hansen (3)|Martin Kernan (2)|Erik Jeppesen (3,4,5)|Meryem Beklioğlu (1,6)
AFFILIATIONS
  1. Biological Sciences Department, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey
  2. ECRC, University College London, London, United Kingdom
  3. Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Silkeborg, Denmark
  4. Sino-Danish Centre for Education and Research (SDC), Beijing, China
  5. Greenland Climate Research Centre (GCRC), Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, Nuuk, Greenland
  6. Kemal Kurdaş Ecological Research and Training Stations, Lake Eymir, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey
ABSTRACTStrong natural or human induced water level fluctuations has been known to have an influence on shallow lakes, especially the ones located in semi-arid to arid Mediterranean climate regions, like Turkey. Biological variables such as, aquatic macrophytes, zooplankton and phytoplankton are also known to react to ecological changes occuring in lakes and thus are valuable indicators of environmental changes. Therefore, in the absence of historical data their sedimentary remains may provide information on the long-term dynamics of the lakes (e.g the effect of water level change). The main aim of this study, which was funded by EU-FP7- REFRESH, was to test the impact of hydrology on ecosystem structure and function using long term instrumental water level data and physical, chemical and biological multiproxies. To achieve this aim, core samples from Lakes Beyşehir, Marmara and Uluabat were retrieved with a Livingstone Piston Corer from littoral and pelagic of the lakes, for sub-fossil cladoceran, diatom, plant remain and pigment analysis. Moreover, all the cores were dated with 210Pb analysis, also X-ray fluorescence (XRF) and loss on ignition (LOI) analysis were conducted. Results from Lake Beyşehir indicated a gradual change throughout the core from benthic associated communities to more pelagic ones. However, the cores from both Lakes Marmara and Uluabat indicated a more benthic ecosystem structure throughout the comprised periods. The results also suggested that the effect of human manipulation through fish introduction or channel/regulator construction influenced the response of the proxies and complicated the interpretations of changing ecological conditions throughout the cores.
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