Abstract
Wetland conservation increasingly must account for climate change and legacies of previous land-use practices. Playa wetlands provide critical wildlife habitat, but may be impacted by intensifying droughts and previous hydrologic modifications. To inform playa restoration planning, we asked: (1) what are the trends in playa inundation? (2) what are the factors influencing inundation? (3) how is playa inundation affected by increasingly severe drought? (4) do certain playas provide hydrologic refugia during droughts, and (5) if so, how are refugia patterns related to historical modifications? Using remotely sensed surface-water data, we evaluated a 30-year time series (1985–2015) of inundation for 153 playas of the Great Basin, USA. Inundation likelihood and duration increased with wetter weather conditions and were greater in modified playas. Inundation probability was projected to decrease from 22% under average conditions to 11% under extreme drought, with respective annual inundation decreasing from 1.7 to 0.9 months. Only 4% of playas were inundated for at least 2 months in each of the 5 driest years, suggesting their potential as drought refugia. Refugial playas were larger and more likely to have been modified, possibly because previous land managers selected refugial playas for modification. These inundation patterns can inform efforts to restore wetland functions and to conserve playa habitats as climate conditions change.
Highlights
The reverse was not necessarily true: consistent wetness in all other years did not always imply consistent wetness during dry years. These results indicate that playas that were consistently inundated during nondrought years did not necessarily serve as drought refugia
We found that playas with dugouts were more likely to hold water, to retain water for longer periods, and to serve as drought refugia, we stress that correlation between modification status and observed playa hydrology does not reveal the nature or direction of causation
Playa wetlands are an understudied but important seasonal water and food resource for migrating birds and other wildlife that may be negatively impacted by climate drying and drought intensification
Summary
Seasonal and ephemeral wetlands are ecologically important across a variety of landscapes, providing habitat to aquatic species and food and water resources to terrestrial species (Leibowitz 2003; Tiner 2003; Bolpagni et al 2019). These wetlands are typically inundated for only part of each year, with hydroperiods (i.e., durations of inundation) that can vary substantially from one wetland to another across small geographic scales (Calhoun et al 2017; Davis et al 2019). Identification of such refugia could improve wetland management and climate adaptation, and potentially inform wetland restoration efforts
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