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Forest defoliator outbreaks alter nutrient cycling in northern waters
- Source :
- Nature Communications, Vol 12, Iss 1, Pp 1-8 (2021), Nature Communications
- Publication Year :
- 2021
- Publisher :
- Springer Science and Business Media LLC, 2021.
-
Abstract
- Insect defoliators alter biogeochemical cycles from land into receiving waters by consuming terrestrial biomass and releasing biolabile frass. Here, we related insect outbreaks to water chemistry across 12 boreal lake catchments over 32-years. We report, on average, 27% lower dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and 112% higher dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) concentrations in lake waters when defoliators covered entire catchments and reduced leaf area. DOC reductions reached 32% when deciduous stands dominated. Within-year changes in DOC from insect outbreaks exceeded 86% of between-year trends across a larger dataset of 266 boreal and north temperate lakes from 1990 to 2016. Similarly, within-year increases in DIN from insect outbreaks exceeded local, between-year changes in DIN by 12-times, on average. As insect defoliator outbreaks occur at least every 5 years across a wider 439,661 km2 boreal ecozone of Ontario, we suggest they are an underappreciated driver of biogeochemical cycles in forest catchments of this region.<br />Defoliating insects disrupt nutrient cycling of boreal catchments by redistributing carbon and nitrogen from forests to lakes. The resulting shift in lake biogeochemistry exceeds broader between-year trends observed across the boreal and north temperate region.
- Subjects :
- 0106 biological sciences
Nutrient cycle
Biogeochemical cycle
Insecta
010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
Ecosystem ecology
Climate Change
Science
General Physics and Astronomy
Forests
010603 evolutionary biology
01 natural sciences
General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
Disease Outbreaks
Element cycles
Forest ecology
parasitic diseases
Temperate climate
631/158/2459
Animals
Biomass
Ecosystem
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Plant Diseases
Ontario
Biomass (ecology)
Multidisciplinary
Ecology
article
Boreal ecology
Biogeochemistry
631/158/2454
General Chemistry
Nutrients
15. Life on land
704/158/2445
6. Clean water
Carbon
631/158/47/4112
Lakes
Deciduous
Boreal
13. Climate action
631/158/2449
Freshwater ecology
Environmental science
Subjects
Details
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Nature Communications, Vol 12, Iss 1, Pp 1-8 (2021), Nature Communications
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....cbf34c207039ebf535352d473473a32f