The Profundal Communities of Candidate Reference Lakes in Ireland

The Water Framework Directive (WFD) requires that lakes be differentiated by typology using physical and chemical factors. For each of the lake types identified, the reference conditions must be determined for the biological communities. There are two approaches that can be taken to define typologies for lakes. Firstly, System A of the WFD can be adopted where types are in a sense arbitrarily defined categories of predefined hydro-morphological factors and community composition is subsequently assessed. Or, System B, which uses obligatory and optional factors. A preliminary investigation of the latter approach is explored here. The profundal community was one of three biological elements surveyed, the others being macrophytes and phytoplankton. Sixty-three candidate lakes were selected and sampled to determine the reference conditions for Irish lakes and define types. The profundal data collected was subjected to classification techniques. The relationships between the profundal communities of the resulting lake groups and their physical and chemical characters were examined.

TIERNEY D.;  BOWMAN J.;  CARONI R.;  DONNELLY K.;  FREE Gary;  LITTLE R.;  MCGARRIGLE M.L.;  KENNEDY N.;  KELLY-QUINN M.;  IRVINE K.; 

2006-02-17

JRC32590

https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC32590,