AUTHORS: Julia R. Hampton, Department of Biology, University of North Dakota; Jason A. DeBoer Illinois River Biological Station, Illinois Natural History Survey, Prairie Research Institute, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; John C. Chick, Great Rivers Field Station, Illinois Natural History Survey, Prairie Research Institute, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Nathan R. De Jager, Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center, United States Geological Survey; Mark A. Kaemingk, Department of Biology, University of North Dakota
ABSTRACT: The physical template of the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS) is continually shaped by climate, land use, and other regional- to global-scale processes. The Upper Mississippi River Restoration Program (UMRR) uses a variety of restoration techniques to improve the resiliency of the river to anthropogenic change. To achieve their management goals, the UMRR collects long-term data on water quality, aquatic vegetation, mussel, and fish communities that are spatially linked to aquatic areas (i.e., habitat types) throughout the UMRS. However, we currently lack a basic understanding of associations among hydrogeomorphic conditions, biogeochemistry, and riverine biota in these aquatic areas, and how future hydrogeomorphic changes may affect the UMRS. Our project proposes to 1) use UMRR long-term data sets (1993-present) to develop a comprehensive understanding of how water quality, aquatic vegetation, mussel, and fish communities are structured spatially and temporally across the UMRS and to quantify associations with important aquatic areas, and 2) leverage goal-one results with future river discharge predictions under climate change to assess future distributions and abundances of aquatic areas and associated abiotic and biotic components. We expect to find differences among abiotic and biotic components across aquatic areas within each UMRS pool, and throughout time, given the differences in habitat characteristics across the river system (e.g., temperature and flow regimes). This project is in its early phases; however, this poster will showcase data availability, expected project outcomes, and the usefulness of long-term resource monitoring. Compiling and collectively evaluating potential shifts in UMRS abiotic and biotic components among aquatic areas throughout space and time will help researchers and managers understand which aquatic area habitats have been altered the most through time. We will also use these results to identify which aquatic areas can be restored to achieve desirable management outcomes under different climate change scenarios.
