Abstract
The intensity and frequency of storms are projected to increase in many regions of the world because of climate change. Storms can alter environmental conditions in many ecosystems. In lakes and reservoirs, storms can reduce epilimnetic temperatures from wind-induced mixing with colder hypolimnetic waters, direct precipitation to the lake's surface, and watershed runoff. We analyzed 18 long-term and high-frequency lake datasets from 11 countries to assess the magnitude of wind- vs. rainstorm-induced changes in epilimnetic temperature. We found small day-to-day epilimnetic temperature decreases in response to strong wind and heavy rain during stratified conditions. Day-to-day epilimnetic temperature decreased, on average, by 0.28°C during the strongest windstorms (storm mean daily wind speed among lakes: 6.7 ± 2.7 m s −1, 1 SD) and by 0.15°C after the heaviest rainstorms (storm mean daily rainfall: 21.3 ± 9.0 mm). The largest decreases in epilimnetic temperature were observed ≥2 d after sustained strong wind or heavy rain (top 5 th percentile of wind and rain events for each lake) in shallow and medium-depth lakes. The smallest decreases occurred in deep lakes. Epilimnetic temperature change from windstorms, but not rainstorms, was negatively correlated with maximum lake depth. However, even the largest storm-induced mean epilimnetic temperature decreases were typically <2°C. Day-to-day temperature change, in the absence of storms, often exceeded storm-induced temperature changes. Because storm-induced temperature changes to lake surface waters were minimal, changes in other limnological variables (e.g., nutrient concentrations or light) from storms may have larger impacts on biological communities than temperature changes.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1979-1992 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| Journal | Limnology and Oceanography |
| Volume | 66 |
| Issue number | 5 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 7 Apr 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This project was initiated within the Global Lake Ecological Observatory Network (GLEON) StormBlitz working group at the 15th All Hands' Meeting and was further developed within the GEISHA project (https://www.geisha-stormblitz.fr/), which was jointly supported by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB) through its synthesis center CESAB (http://www.cesab.org/), and the USGS John Wesley Powell Center for Analysis and Synthesis (https://powellcenter.usgs.gov/). We thank the U.S. Department of State and the Commission Franco-Américaine for financial support through a Fulbright Award to JDS to support this study. We also thank the University of Savoie Mont-Blanc and the Vermont Water Resources and Lake Studies Center (G16AP00087) for additional funding. The Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries is acknowledged for financial support of the IGB long-term ecological research programme (Lakes Müggelsee and Stechlin). The German EPA (Umweltbundesamt, UBA) is thanked for measuring wind and precipitation at Lake Stechlin. Harp Lake data collection was supported by the Ontario Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change. Collection of Oneida Lake data was supported by the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and the Brown Endowment. Data from Lake Erken was made possible by the Swedish Infrastructure for Ecosystem Science (SITES). Long-term monitoring of Windermere is supported by the Natural Environment Research Council award number NE/R016429/1 as part of the UK-SCaPE programme delivering National Capability. Data from Rimov were collected and evaluated with the support of the Czech Science Foundation, research project 15-13750S. The collection of Lake Washington and Lake Sammamish temperature data was made possible through the support of the King County Environmental Laboratory. The Belgian Science Policy Office (BELSPO) is acknowledged for their support through the research project EAGLES, (SD/AR/02A), which provided the data from Lake Kivu, collected during the “Biological Baseline of Lake Kivu”, supported by the Belgian Technical Cooperation. Cheney Reservoir data collection was funded by the U.S. Geological Survey Cooperative Matching Funds Program and the City of Wichita, Kansas. Any use of trade, product, or firm names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government. RA acknowledges support by the Mantel-ITN project (H2020-MSCA-ITN-2016 and the LimnoScenES project; Belmont Forum—BiodivERsA). La Salada data collection was supported by grants from the network project PAMPA2 (CONICET), ANPCyT, Universidad Nacional del Sur (PGI 24/ G059), and the Inter American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) CRN3038 (under US NSF Award GEO 1128040). We thank R. Bruel, N. P. M. van Lipzig, P. Nõges, and R. I. Woolway for statistical assistance and helpful comments on the manuscript.
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© 2021 The Authors. Limnology and Oceanography published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography.
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