Simulations of water quality and oxythermal cisco habitat in Minnesota lakes under past and future climate scenarios

Abstract

A deterministic, process-oriented, dynamic and one-dimensional year-round lake water quality model, MINLAKE2010, was developed for water temperature (T) and dissolved oxygen (DO) simulations to study impacts of climate warming on lake water quality and cisco fish habitat. The DO model is able to simulate metalimnetic oxygen maxima in vertical DO profiles of oligotrophic lakes. The model was calibrated with profile data from the 28 study lakes in Minnesota; two-thirds of them are deep mesotrophic/oligotrophic lakes that support cisco, a coldwater fish species. The average standard error of estimate against measured data was 1.47 °C for T and 1.50 mg/L for DO. Oxythermal habitat parameter TDO3 (T at DO = 3 mg/L) was determined from simulated daily T and DO profiles under past and future climate scenarios in the 28 study lakes. Average annual maximum TDO3 (TDO3AM) for the 28 study lakes is projected to increase on the average of 3.2 °C under the MIROC 3.2 future scenario, while the occurrence day of TDO3AM is not much different under past and future climate scenarios. Both physical processes (mixing characteristics related to lake geometry ratio) and trophic status control temperature and DO characteristics and then affect cisco habitat in a lake.