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... increased levels of agriculture or urbanisation) or improvement (e.g. implementation of remediation or policy measures -'oligotrophication') of ecological status to activities occurring in the catchment (Klais et al., 2015). Additionally, indicators are an important facet of monitoring programmes as they provide the crucial linkage whereby data are transformed into useful information; thus informing management responses and enabling communication of results with interested parties (Carstensen et al., 2012). ...
... Additionally, indicators are an important facet of monitoring programmes as they provide the crucial linkage whereby data are transformed into useful information; thus informing management responses and enabling communication of results with interested parties (Carstensen et al., 2012). From a purely scientific standpoint, long-term monitoring programs provide an invaluable source of data for research studies (Klais et al., 2015). ...
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Microalgae are one of the most important components of estuarine ecosystems, providing the fuel required to sustain higher trophic levels. Being at the base of aquatic food webs, these communities are generally the first to respond to anthropogenic disturbances – particularly opportunistic species – and can often be used effectively as indicators of ecosystem health. The purpose of this review is to assess the status of estuarine microalgal research in South Africa and to highlight the shortcomings of past research and identify priorities for future research. What became apparent during a synthesis of South African literature on the topic, was that the broad ecology of microalgae – both phytoplankton and microphytobenthos – has been well addressed. Generally speaking, the interaction between freshwater inflow and microalgal communities has formed the basis for the majority of this research. This trend was logical due to South Africa being a relatively arid country, where demand for freshwater often exceeds supply. In terms of microalgal studies however, numerous shortcomings can be identified, including the lack of: (1) thorough assessments of microalgal community composition; (2) conclusive demonstration of the role of suggested indicator species; (3) adequate sampling periods and/or intensity; and (4) fine-scale experimental research – both in situ and laboratory. A concern on a broader scale, and in stark contrast to Europe and the United States, is the lack of explicit assessment of what comprises eutrophication in South African estuaries. Finally, and perhaps the most pertinent theme identified in this review is the necessity for adopting ‘hypothesis-driven research’.
... Monitoring programs may also facilitate decisions to adjust management practices to maintain or improve environmental conditions (Borja et al. 2016). Data harmonisation and publicly available datasets are required to allow and promote scientific use and increase the value of monitoring data (Klais et al. 2015, Zingone et al. 2015. ...
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Dear all, I just realized a mistake in this publication. On page 204 (column 1) it says "Generally, Gc can become abundant in several sub-basins of the Baltic Sea during the spring bloom (Sundström et al. 2010)." However, the correct reference here is Sundström et al. 2009, which is also part of the reference list in the published version. I am sorry for the inconvenience. Have a nice day! Cordially, Tobias Lipsewers Here the abstract in the following: Lipsewers T. 2023: Resolving species-specific abundances of three cold-water dinoflagellates using a simple staining technique. Boreal Env. Res. 28: 195-206. The dinoflagellates Gymnodinium corollarium (Gc), Biecheleria baltica (Bb), and Apoca-lathium malmogiense (Am) are very difficult to separate using traditional light microscopy. Their dominance patterns may have ecosystem-wide consequences in terms of, e.g., the Baltic Sea carbon cycle. This study describes a protocol to separate them, determines their relative abundances, and suggests the adjustment of monitoring programs. A relatively simple staining technique was found to be suitable to identify Gc, Bb, and Am. Opposite trends were observed for Gc (increasing) and Bb (decreasing) along with the spring bloom, indicating different niches. Two clusters of sub-basins were identified: 1) almost absolute dominance of the usually grouped biomass by Gc; and 2) Bb also became dominant. Gc occasionally dominated even the overall microscopy-derived biomass, Bb clearly contributed , and Am contributed minor proportions. The proposed strategy can be implemented in monitoring protocols. This will facilitate the tracking of changes within Baltic Sea phytoplankton assemblages.
... Time is therefore ripe for revisiting and rethinking philosophical analyses of the structure of science and its development". According to Klais et al. (2015) that long term monitoring of phytoplankton requires commitment (and expertise) not only for monitoring purposes but also to provide reliable and defensible data for the scientific community, managers and communities that rely on these variable and critical ecosystems, for this to take place data must be made available (and in different formats for different users). ...
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Marine, coastal and ocean development has gained impetus around the globe and in particular along Africa’s coastal states. A socio-ecological systems framework approach was adopted to explore marine and coastal socio-ecological systems in Algoa Bay, situated in the Eastern Cape, South Africa a Bay with a rich history steeped in culture and diversity. Phytoplankton biodiversity was determined for the Bay to characterise aspects of the marine environment in Algoa Bay. The policy landscape for South Africa was also analysed to characterise the governance landscape and identify if the policies, legislation and frameworks adopted and applied would support socio-ecological systems thinking and support equitable development of marine and coastal resources. Positives raised by manager are the general positive attitude and proenvironmental value system. To understand how people within the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality value the marine and coastal environment, their knowledge of phytoplankton and services provided, governance knowledge, attitudes towards the future of the socioenvironment landscape and value positions that would identify pro-environmental behaviour of the communities surveyed. Loss of marine and coastal environments and services would be a direct threat to spiritual and cultural practices and beliefs of the amaXhosa. Further access was a driving theme in this study and therefore development and conservation efforts need to heed the value and importance of having access to the marine and coastal environment, not only for sustaining livelihoods but for religious and leisure experiences. 8 Size fractionated biomass was determined to describe the contribution of different cell size assemblages to the overall productivity of Algoa Bay. The analysis showed a general dominance of microplankton cell sizes with the picoplankton not contributing much towards the overall biomass of the period analysed. Cell size of the phytoplankton species provides an indication of the environmental changes, together with contribution towards biomass. Species that bloom also change the productivity of the system, for example a diatom bloom will increase productivity more so than a dinoflagellate bloom. Cell size will influence response of phytoplankton to environmental changes and how phytoplankton adapts physiologically to stressors such as climate change. However in the context of studies linking biodiversity to a socio-ecological framework, size fractionated data is not required and overall productivity and diversity of the system is better suited for this type of study. The direct link between the ecological and social data is the application of the information for management of the ecosystem and as an early warning system. The information learnt from the managers and community also highlights the need for a shared approach to gathering knowledge and learning about the world around us.
... The microalgae comprising the phytoplankton are the main primary producers in the ocean ( Klais et al. 2015), and diatoms contribute about 40% to marine primary productivity (Carstensen et al. 2015). The contrasting phytoplankton populations' characteristic of different niches may reflect species or population-specific strategies to adapt to different regional environments ( Cerino et al. 2005;Barnett et al. 2015). ...
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Marine diatoms are ubiquitously distributed in both coastal and open oceans, playing an important role in global primary productivity. In coastal waters, they are exposed to various pollutants in addition to multiple environmental stressors. Here, we show the pennate diatom Nitzschia sp. isolated from the East China Sea decreased its photosynthetic performance under the combined influences of two typical marine organic pollutants (Irgarol 1051 and diuron), that are frequently used as biocides to prevent biofouling, and solar UV radiation (UVR). Nitzschia sp. was sensitive to both pollutants under visible light (PAR) without UVR, even at the lowest concentration (0.5 μg L−1) tested; higher levels led to greater reductions in its photochemical yield. When additionally exposed to UVR (280–400 nm), the inhibition of the quantum yields by the antifouling pollutants was exacerbated, reflecting a synergistic impact of the pollutants and UVR. Exposure to UVR brought about 5–20% reduction at different levels of Irgarol 1051, diuron, and their mixture, with a higher reduction percentage due to UVR observed at lower concentrations of the pollutants. Our results indicate that even low levels of antifouling agents can result in significant impacts on diatoms in the presence of solar UVR, implying that combinations of UVR and organic pollutants could be a potential method to control-target algal biofouling.
... The IMOS NRS biological dataset provides species-level information for both phytoplankton and zooplankton, as well as related physical and chemical parameters. Data on phytoplankton and zooplankton community composition is critical for assessing lower trophic level and ecosystem responses to environmental change (Edwards et al., 2010), and plankton are well established indicators for estuarine (Paerl et al., 2007), coastal (Klaiss et al., 2015) and oceanic systems (Richardson et al., 2006;Racault et al., 2014). Phytoplankton are sensitive to variations in the surrounding environment, as they have specific temperature and light regimes (Miller, 2003;Valdes-Weaver et al., 2006), and their high surface area to volume ratio enables rapid response to nutrient availability. ...
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The Integrated Marine Observing System National Reference Station network provides unprecedented open access to species-level phytoplankton and zooplankton data for researchers, managers and policy makers interested in resource condition, and detecting and understanding the magnitude and time-scales of change in our marine environment. We describe how to access spatial and temporal plankton data collected from the seven reference stations located around the Australian coastline, and a summary of the associated physical and chemical parameters measured that help in the interpretation of plankton data. Details on the rationale for site locations, sampling methodologies and laboratory analysis protocols are provided to assist with use of the data, and design of complimentary investigations. Information on taxonomic entities reported in the plankton database, and changes in taxonomic nomenclature and other issues that may affect data interpretation, are included. Data from more than 1250 plankton samples are freely available via the Australian Ocean Data Network portal and we encourage uptake and use of this continental-scale dataset, giving summaries of data currently available and some practical applications. The full methods manual that includes sampling and analysis protocols for the Integrated Marine Observing System Biogeochemical Operations can be found on-line.
... Monitoring programs should be carried out in a rigorous way in terms of spatial and temporal coverage and community composition should be coupled with complementing environmental data (De Jonge et al. 2006). Data harmonization and publicly available meta-data is important for promoting scientific use (Klais et al. 2015, Zingone et al. 2015. However, due to the cost of microscopy, plankton monitoring programs always need to make compromises of where and when samples are taken, to which taxonomical level identification is carried out, and which organism groups are identified and quantified. ...
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Finnish plankton monitoring is divided into phytoplankton and mesozooplankton sampling. Using the phytoplankton protocol, we included all organisms identified in samples from the Baltic Sea during spring (n = 125). The plankton was converted to carbon, and including all microscopy derived carbon (MDC), increased the carbon content by 22%, on average, compared with only phytoplankton. Particulate organic carbon (POC) and chlorophyll a (Chl a) were also measured, and the general relationship between MDC and POC was: slope = 1.04, intercept = 240 μg POC l–1, R2 = 0.66; for phytoplankton to Chl a: 0.037 g Chl a (g MDC)–1, R2 = 0.68. Our results demonstrate that a variable fraction of the plankton biomass is not recorded in the monitoring programs. Most of the unaccounted biomass was ciliates, which constituted 14.1% ± 3.7% (mean ± maximum error) of the plankton biomass. Based on the results we recommend including microzooplankton in the existing phytoplankton monitoring program.
... Obviously long-term series are much valuable beyond their local use as a source of information for cross-system anal- ysis, in particular within a network. Therefore harmonization is a prior- ity, and it is fostered and sustained in the LTER-Europe and ILTER networks Mirtl et al., 2018;Mollenhauer et al., 2018) as well as in other contexts concerned with long-term studies on plankton, such as the SCOR working group 137 ( Klais et al., 2015) on global phytoplankton dynamics in coastal ecosystems the IOC- UNESCO International Group on Marine Time Series (IGMETS http:// igmets.net/) and Working group to investigate Climate Change and Global Trends of Phytoplankton in the Ocean (Trends PO, http:// trendspo.net/). ...
Article
A first synoptic and trans-domain overviewof plankton dynamics was conducted across the aquatic sites belonging to the Italian Long-Term Ecological Research Network (LTER-Italy). Based on published studies, checked and complemented with unpublished information, we investigated phytoplankton and zooplankton annual dynamics and long-term changes across domains: from the large subalpine lakes to mountain lakes and artificial lakes, from lagoons to marine coastal ecosystems. This study permitted identifying common and unique environmental drivers and ecological functional processes controlling seasonal and long-termtemporal course. The most relevant patterns of plankton seasonal succession were revealed, showing that the driving factors were nutrient availability, stratification regime, and freshwater inflow. Phytoplankton and mesozooplankton displayed a wide interannual variability at most sites. Unidirectional or linear long-term trends were rarely detected but all sites were impacted across the years by at least one, but in many case several major stressor(s): nutrient inputs, meteo-climatic variability at the local and regional scale, and direct human activities at specific sites. Different climatic and anthropic orcings frequently co-occurred, whereby the responses of plankton communities were the result of this environmental complexity. Overall, the LTER investigations are providing an unparalleled framework of knowledge to evaluate changes in the aquatic pelagic systems and management options.
... Komposisi jenis fitoplakton paling beragam yang ditemukan didominasi oleh kelas Diatom. Diatom merupakan komunitas epipelagik yang sering ditemui di suatu perairan (Klais et al., 2015). Hal ini dikarenakan keanekaragaman Diatom sangat dipengaruhi oleh berbagai macam faktor lingkungan dan struktur komunitas Diatom dapat merespon dengan cepat perubahan fisik, kimia dan biologi lingkungan (Trigueros & Orive, 2001;Mooser et al., 1996cit. ...
... In oceanic and continental waters, phytoplankton variability is well understood, whereas no patterns have been clearly established for the productive coastal ecosystems at the land-sea interface (Cloern & Jassby 2010). The continuous and systematic collection of information on the microalgae in these ecosystems will facilitate the characterization of common scientific principles of ecosystem functioning and the ability to make comparisons among sites (Klais et al. 2015). However, according to Cloern & Jassby (2008), an analysis of phytoplankton variability in 114 coastal ecosystems showed a 'surprisingly broad spectrum of seasonal patterns'. ...
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Three sampling stations located in the inner Patos Lagoon estuary, the lagoon’s mouth and the adjacent coastal beach were visited monthly from the end of 1992 until 2014. The stations are in close proximity, but are distributed along saline and hydrological gradients and had never previously been analysed together. Our main questions were: (1) Are the monthly, seasonal and interannual variations in chlorophyll a (Chl a) similar for the three stations? (2) Is there any type of connectivity among the sites? (3) What forces are responsible for controlling phytoplankton variability at these stations? The three stations showed distinct Chl a variability patterns, with higher concentration and variability at the beach station, where the seasonal variation presented higher values between May and October, seemingly out of phase with the estuarine station, where higher values occurred between September and January. The lagoon's mouth station acted as a transit region and incorporated the variability of the estuarine and coastal regions, and all three stations showed a lasting long-term influence from the remote and large-scale phenomenon El Niño Southern Oscillation, El Niño and La Niña periods being characterized by an increase in rainfall and drought conditions, respectively, in the region. The three stations showed no clear connectivity since the cross correlation analysis did not indicate subsequent (more than one month) influence of any station on the others with regard to Chl a. However, a large transfer of the surf-zone diatom, Asterionellopsis guyunusae, from the coast towards the estuary was observed in an apparent ‘inverted outwelling’ process. Chl a variability did not show a straight relationship with most of the measured abiotic variables, indicating that other forces such as residence time may be of greater importance.
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The basin of Thau in southern France is a shallow, weakly flushed lagoon which is an important location for oyster cultivation. Phytoplankton analyses were carried out in 1975–1976 and then (almost) continuously since 1987. We report an investigation of ‘the balance of organisms’ in phytoplankton in relation to reductions in phosphorus loading, using two new tools based on phytoplankton lifeforms: the Plankton Index for Phytoplankton (PIp); Euclidean distance in state space. Our results show the utility of the tools for analysing changes in the ‘balance of organisms’ at the level of functional groups (in our study diatoms and dinoflagellates), but also illustrate the difficulties in demonstrating the reversal of human impacts resulting from eutrophication.
Chapter
This book is the second of two volumes in a series on terrestrial and marine comparisons, focusing on the temporal complement of the earlier spatial analysis of patchiness and pattern (Levin et al. 1993). The issue of the relationships among pattern, scale, and patchiness has been framed forcefully in John Steele’s writings of two decades (e.g., Steele 1978). There is no pattern without an observational frame. In the words of Nietzsche, “There are no facts… only interpretations.”
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Vertical patterns of phytoplankton biomass driven by phytoflagellate migration constitute a natural, short-term process with potentially important impacts on estuarine primary production and community composition. Although often considered well-mixed, phytoflagellate vertical migration patterns have been observed in shallow estuaries. We investigated vertical migration patterns in two shallow estuaries to determine how often and under what environmental conditions vertical migration patterns occurred, and to understand the potential impacts of vertical migration on phytoplankton composition and productivity. Vertical migration patterns were determined from circumannual records of decimeter-scale, semihourly, vertical profiles of chlorophyll fluorescence in two shallow, microtidal estuaries, the New River Estuary and Neuse River Estuary, North Carolina, USA. Observed migration patterns were compared with coincident measures of temperature, salinity, light, turbidity, nutrients, vertical stratification, and wind speed. A simple light × biomass model was used to estimate the influence of vertical migration patterns on total water column primary production. Collectively, between two sites in each estuary, diel vertical migration (DVM) patterns were detected on about half of the days. A secondary migration pattern reflecting a midday descent was also observed and was attributed to avoidance of intense midday surface irradiance. The likelihood of detectable DVM patterns increased under warmer conditions and lower incident irradiance, and at two of the stations was lessened by elevated wind speeds or reduced stratification intensity. Even weak stratification may be sufficient to reduce vertical mixing to levels that allow effective depth regulation by directed swimming. Modeled depth-integrated primary production was increased modestly (<10%) by observed migration patterns compared to a hypothetical vertically-homogenous biomass distribution. Access to optimal light levels and elevated bottom water dissolved inorganic nitrogen concentrations provides selective advantages that may explain phytoflagellate dominance in these estuaries, particularly during the warmer months, when production in surface waters of both systems is strongly N-limited.