Submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) in lake littoral zones is an inland water wetland type that provides numerous essential ecosystem services, such as supplying food and habitat for fauna, regulating nutrient fluxes, stabilizing sediments, and maintaining a clear water state. However, little is known on how inland SAV quantities are changing globally in response to human activities, where loss threatens the provisioning of these ecosystem services. In this study, we generate a comprehensive global synthesis of trends in SAV quantities using time series (>10 years) in lakes and identify their main drivers. We compiled trends across methods and metrics, integrating both observational and paleolimnological approaches as well as diverse measures of SAV quantities, including areal extent, density, or abundance classes. The compilation revealed that knowledge on SAV is mostly derived from temperate regions, with major gaps in tropical, boreal, and mountainous lake‐rich regions. Similar to other wetland types, we found that 41% of SAV times series are largely decreasing mostly due to land use change and resulting eutrophication. SAV is, however, increasing in 28% of cases, primarily since the 1980s. We show that trends and drivers of SAV quantities vary regionally, with increases in Europe explained mainly by management, decreases in Asia due to eutrophication and land use change, and variable trends in North America consistent with invasive species arrival. By providing a quantitative portrait of trends in SAV quantities worldwide, we identify knowledge gaps and future SAV research priorities. By considering the drivers of different trends, we also offer insight to future lake management related to climate, positive restoration actions, and change in community structure on SAV quantities.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1111/gcb.16619

Global historical trends and drivers of submerged aquatic vegetation quantities in lakes

A multi-proxy record of environmental change through the last 53,000 years recorded in the sediments of Lake Kanono, Northland, New Zealand

Lakes are becoming degraded at an accelerating rate owing to human activity, and understanding their past ecology is necessary for lake management and rehabilitation. Palaeolimnology provides numerous methods that enable the historical state of lakes to be determined. New Zealand provides an ideal setting in which to do this as human modification of the landscape occurred later here than in most regions of the world (approx. 1300 CE). Lake Oporoa is a shallow lake that is highly significant to the local indigenous Māori community. This study used multiple proxy palaeolimnology to explore how lake ecology shifted following Māori and European settlement in the catchment, and how palaeolimnological data can be used to inform lake rehabilitation and conservation measures, alongside the desires of the indigenous community. Sedimentary pollen, diatoms, bacterial communities, and elemental and hyperspectral imaging scanning were used to infer ecological changes in the lake and catchment from pre-human times to present. Following Māori settlement (approx. 1620 CE) there was gradual vegetation change and a rapid shift in diatom and bacterial assemblages, but not in phytoplankton pigments or sediment geochemistry. An increasing abundance of diatom taxa Discostella stelligera and Staurosirella cf. ovata indicates early nutrient enrichment. European pastoralism from approximately 1840 CE resulted in further deforestation, and all proxies show evidence for enhanced primary productivity driven by a combination of nutrient enrichment and changing lake levels, particularly since the 1960s. This has caused degradation in water quality and is likely to have contributed to the decline in populations of tuna (eel, Anguilla spp.). Conversations with local Māori, together with the palaeolimnological results, indicate that a culturally acceptable and realistic rehabilitation target for Lake Oporoa aligns with ecological conditions in the 1950s. The palaeoecological data provide information to guide catchment and lake revegetation and other methods of nutrient abatement, with the eventual aim of restoring culturally important tuna and native fish populations. 

Using palaeolimnology to guide rehabilitation of a culturally significant lake in New Zealand

A multi-proxy μ-XRF inferred lake sediment record of environmental change spanning the last ca. 2230 years from Lake Kanono, Northland, New Zealand

Climates of the last three interglacials in subtropical eastern Australia inferred from wetland sediment geochemistry

The Northland region of New Zealand includes numerous high-value, macrophyte-dominated dune lakes. Recent water policy reforms offer limited guidance on managing for aquatic macrophytes. In...

Managing land-use effects on Northland dune lakes: lessons from the past

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Managing land-use effects on Northland dune lakes: lessons from the past