Abstract
High-mountain lakes are among the most comparable ecosystems globally and recognized sentinels of global change. The present study pursued to identify how the benthic macroinvertebrates (BMI) communities of two tropical, high mountain lakes, El Sol and La Luna, Central Mexico, have been affected by global/regional environmental pressures. We compared the environmental characteristics and the BMI communities between 2000–2001 and 2017–2018. We identified three principal environmental changes (the air and water temperature increased, the lakes’ water level declined, and the pH augmented and became more variable), and four principal ecological changes in the BMI communities [a species richness reduction (7 to 4), a composition change, and a dominant species replacement all of them in Lake El Sol, a species richness increase (2 to 4) in Lake La Luna, and a drastic reduction in density (38% and 90%) and biomass (92%) in both lakes]. The air and water temperature increased 0.5 °C, and lakes water level declined 1.5 m, all suggesting an outcome of climate change. Contrarily to the expected acidification associated with acid precipitation, both lakes deacidified, and the annual pH fluctuation augmented. The causes of the deacidification and the deleterious impacts on the BMI communities remained to be identified.
Highlights
Lake ecosystems are vulnerable to environmental change
We addressed the following research questions: (1) How have the environmental water characteristics— pH and water temperature—changed during the past 18 years? (2) How have the benthic macroinvertebrates (BMI) community’s composition and structure changed during the past 18 years?
We anticipated an increase in air temperature and decrease rainfall, both evidencing a response to climate change
Summary
Lake ecosystems are vulnerable to environmental change This vulnerability makes them in good sentinels of environmental change [1]. Lakes provide early indications of climate change effects on ecosystem structure and functioning [2] and play as regulators of climate change [3]. Lakes comprise a geographically distributed network that makes them essential sentinels [4]; among them, high-mountain lakes are the most comparable ecosystems in the world [5]. Their naturally acidic waters with low alkaline reserve and mineralization make them especially sensitive to global change [6,7,8]
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