Phytoplankton and bacterioplankton abundances and community dynamics in Lake Erhai

Abstract

The composition and seasonal variation of the phytoplankton and bacterioplankton community were investigated, and SPSS and redundancy analysis (RDA) were used to explore the relationship between the phytoplankton and bacterioplankton community dynamics in the typical plateau Lake of Lake Erhai from July 2009 to April 2010. Obvious seasonal variation of phytoplankton was observed, and the abundance of phytoplankton ranged from 2.02 × 10(6) to 57.9 × 10(6) cells/L. The dominant species in autumn and summer was Microcystis sp., Psephonema aenigmaticum Skuja was dominant in winter, and Microcystis sp., Aphanizonmenon flos-aquae, Asterionella sp., P. aenigmaticum, etc. were dominant in spring. The abundance of bacterioplankton in the whole lake changed between 1.93 × 10(9) and 4.61 × 10(9) cells/L showing distinct seasonal variation characteristics. The results of correlation and RDA indicated that the abundance and community diversity of bacterioplankton were significantly correlated with the abundance of phytoplankton, and the group of Bacteroidetes had obvious correlation with Microcystis sp. and other cyanobacteria, which might have some links with the harmful algal blooms in Lake Erhai. Further research is needed to study the mechanisms of interactions between phytoplankton and bacterioplankton communities.