Stagnate summers : climate induced changes in physical mixing parameters in Missouri reservoirs

Abstract

Lakes and reservoirs are important environmental sentinels for climate change. As air temperatures rise so do the temperatures of these water bodies affecting their physical, chemical, and biological properties. Being used for drinking water supplies, fisheries, and human recreation, these long term potential changes can be an important factor for their use. Climate change has been associated with altering physical reservoir parameters, such as mixing depth, water temperatures, and water chemistry. Using a historical dataset to find both break points and monotonic trends that may indicate climate having influenced our reservoirs we found little in terms of monotonic trends. However, we did witness changes in all systems in regards to break points for almost every parameter. Our systems cannot directly correlate to having had climate change based effects, as we can neither support or refute its evidence in our reservoirs as changes relating to climate do not only impact physical parameters but also animal and plant communities, and social factors such as use (influenced by cyanobacteria blooms). It is even plausible that increased in reservoir production and turbidity could lead to shifts in physical trends that would otherwise be different in non-affected reservoirs. Over all more information is needed to create a better picture of exactly how climate change is impacting the physical mixing parameters in Missouri reservoirs as they are complex and varied systems.