Changes in water quality and trophic status associated with cage aquaculture in Lake Maninjau, Indonesia

Abstract

The cage aquaculture unquestionably has been degrading lake water quality by increasing nutrients and organic carbon in lake water and sediments. The question is to what extend this condition affects other key indictors such as the temporal changes in trophic status and the thickness of anoxic hypolimnion layer where the anoxic water column is moving upward pushing up the oxic epilimnion layer. The condition in Lake Maninjau could be worse since the lake is steadily producing sulfide which can cause not only oxygen depletion in the water column but also the phosphate release from the sediments. The study is based on the long term monitoring data from on going research for about 8 years observation. The results indeed show the anoxic water column is moving upward increasing the thickness of anoxic hypolimnion layer and decreasing epilimnion layer from 30 m to 10 m depth. The trophic status of the lake also has changed from mesotrophic to eutrophic decreasing the water transparency to even a critical level < 1m. The months of July to September with prolonged hot season could be the critical time for trophic condition for the lake. The results suggest that determination of these conditions further could help identify and predict the critical time for possibility of fish kill.