Abstract
The Great Salt Lake Ecosystem (Utah, USA): long term data and a structural equation approach: Comment
Highlights
The Great Salt Lake Ecosystem (Utah, USA): long term data and a structural equation approach: Comment
WURTSBAUGH1, Belovsky et al (2011) made a remarkable effort to assemble 13 years of limnological data collected by different groups, and describe the dynamics of nutrients, phytoplankton, brine shrimp (Artemia franciscana), birds and other ecosystem components in the Great Salt Lake (Utah)
Phytoplankton estimates Belovsky et al reported that chlorophytes usually represented much less than half of the phytoplankton numerical abundance in Gilbert Bay, whereas other authors generally have indicated that the chlorophytes, Dunaliella spp., dominate the plankton assemblage at most salinities in the lake (Stephens and Gillespie 1976, Felix and Rushforth 1980, Rushforth and Felix 1982)
Summary
Great Salt Lake Ecosystem (Utah, USA): long term data and a structural equation approach: Comment. More work should be done to address the discrepancy between the USU and GSLEP methodologies, Eq 1 provides a more appropriate estimate of the relationship between Secchi depths and chlorophyll concentrations than that given in Fig. 15a of Belovsky et al. Chlorophyll-Artemia relationships An important purported finding in the Belovsky et al paper was a positive correlation between annual (January–March) maximum chlorophyll concentrations in the Great Salt Lake and the subsequent total density of brine shrimp during the following April–October growth period. Chlorophyll-Artemia relationships An important purported finding in the Belovsky et al paper was a positive correlation between annual (January–March) maximum chlorophyll concentrations in the Great Salt Lake and the subsequent total density of brine shrimp during the following April–October growth period To construct this regression, several additional data points for previous years (1970, 1971, 1973, and 1985) were added from the literature. Censusing errors could have contributed to the large estimated changes in densities since ,4% of the area of Gilbert Bay was included in the aerial surveys used by Belovsky et al (Paul et al 1999)
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