inland water ecosystem
inland water ecosystem, complex of living organisms in free water on continental landmasses.
Inland waters represent parts of the biosphere within which marked biological diversity, complex biogeochemical pathways, and an array of energetic processes occur. Although from a geographic perspective inland waters represent only a small fraction of the biosphere, when appreciated from an ecological viewpoint, they are seen to be major contributors to biospheric diversity, structure, and function.
The origin of inland waters
Only a relatively small fraction of the total amount of water in the biosphere is found as free water on continental landmasses. The oceans contain about 97.6 percent of the biosphere’s water, and polar ice, groundwater, and water vapour take up another 2.4 percent. Thus, less than 1 percent exists as continental free water, which is generally referred to as inland water. In spite of this small percentage, inland water is an essential element of the biosphere. It occurs in a wide variety of forms and is inhabited by a diverse set of biological communities, quite distinct from the communities of marine and terrestrial ecosystems.
All inland waters originate from the ocean, principally through evaporation, and ultimately return to this source. This process is part of the global hydrologic cycle. A major feature of this cycle is that more water evaporates from the ocean than is directly precipitated back into it. The balance of water vapour is precipitated as rain, snow, or hail over continental landmasses whence it either evaporates into the atmosphere (about 70 percent) or drains into the sea. (For more information and a schematic representation of the hydrologic cycle, see hydrosphere.)
On the surface of the land, free water habitats can be classified as either lotic (running-water) or lentic (standing-water). Lotic habitats include rivers, streams, and brooks, and lentic habitats include lakes, ponds, and marshes. Both habitats are linked into drainage systems of three major sorts: exorheic, endorheic, and arheic. Exorheic regions are open systems in which surface waters ultimately drain to the ocean in well-defined patterns that involve streams and rivers temporarily impounded by permanent freshwater lakes. Endorheic regions are considered closed systems because, rather than draining to the sea, surface waters drain to inland termini whence they evaporate or seep away. Typically, the termini are permanent or temporary lakes that become saline as evaporation concentrates dissolved salts that either have been introduced by rainwater or have been leached out of substrata within the drainage basin. In arheic systems water falls unpredictably in small amounts and follows haphazard drainage patterns. Apart from rivers that arise outside the region (allogenic rivers) and areas fed from underground sources of water, most bodies of water within arheic regions are temporary.
Inland water also is found beneath the land’s surface. Considerable amounts of groundwater are found within permeable rock strata, and bodies of water are found within caves and other subterranean rock formations, generally of limestone. Subsurface inland waters also are important in the global hydrologic cycle, and some are of biological interest.
On the basis of whether inland waters are lotic or lentic, permanent or temporary, fresh or saline, it is possible to distinguish five major types of inland waters: among lentic systems are three types—permanent freshwater, temporary freshwater, and permanent saline—and among lotic systems are two types—permanent and temporary. These types are not equally distributed among the continents. As one would expect, permanent waters, both lotic and lentic, are more characteristic of temperate and tropical regions, and temporary waters, again both lotic and lentic, are found more often in dry regions. Salt lakes are also more characteristic of dry regions. Whatever the major type of water, however, drainage lines and basins are necessary for inland waters to occur. These features result from many geologic processes, such as erosion and sedimentation. Lentic waters occupy basins formed by glaciers, volcanoes, rivers, wind, tectonics (movements of the Earth’s crust), and chemical weathering. Humans also have created many lakelike habitats, including reservoirs, impoundments, and farm dams. Lotic waters develop in the lowest topographic area of the landscape, which is eroded and sculpted by water flowing through it.
The environment
Physical and chemical properties of water
Water has several unique physical and chemical properties that have influenced life as it has evolved. Indeed, the very concept of the Earth as biosphere is dependent on the special physicochemical properties of water. These characteristics have significantly influenced the structure of inland aquatic ecosystems.
At prevailing global temperatures most inland waters exist in liquid form. As a liquid, water has special thermal features that minimize temperature fluctuations. First among these features is its high specific heat—i.e., a relatively large amount of heat is required to raise the temperature of water. The quantity of heat required to convert water from a liquid to a gaseous state (latent heat of evaporation) or from a solid to a liquid state (latent heat of fusion) is also high. This capacity to absorb heat has several important consequences for the biosphere, including the ability of inland waters to moderate seasonal and diurnal (daily) temperature differences both within aquatic ecosystems and, to a lesser extent, beyond them. Most of the heat input to inland waters is in the form of solar energy. The amount of this energy that actually reaches inland waters at any given time depends on several factors, including time of day, season, latitude, altitude, and amount of cloud cover. A significant fraction of the solar radiation that reaches the water surface is lost through reflection and backscattering. The remaining fraction enters the water column where its energy rapidly diminishes with depth as it is absorbed and converted either to heat by physical processes or to chemical energy by the biological process of photosynthesis. In large, deep lakes most of the energy required by the biota is derived from this biological conversion. In other sorts of inland waters, however, a large proportion of the energy required by biological communities may come from emergent and nearby terrestrial vegetation. In any event, the amount and nature of solar energy entering inland waters is a principal determinant of the structure and function of the ecosystem.
The conversion of light energy into heat in inland waters has several significant physical consequences. Of special note are the changes that occur to water density as temperature varies. This relationship is illustrated in , in which the density of pure water is plotted against temperature as a measure of heat content. Note that water has the greatest density at 4° C. Although this relationship is that of pure water, it closely approximates that of fresh water. Thus, ice, which forms at 0° C, develops first at the surface of freshwater lakes, above slightly warmer, denser water, and prevents lakes from freezing solid. Were this not the case, the biology of inland waters would be quite different. In saline waters, however, the relationship is somewhat different because greater concentrations of dissolved salts lower both the freezing point and the temperature of maximum density.
One of the most significant chemical properties of water is its function as a solvent. In this regard it has an unrivaled capacity to hold in solution an exceptionally wide range of substances, including electrolytes (salts, which dissociate into ions in aqueous solution), colloids (particulate matter small enough to remain suspended in solution), and nonelectrolytes (substances such as glucose that retain their molecular structure and do not dissociate into ions). A great variety of combinations of dissolved substances can occur in inland waters. Nevertheless, it is possible to discern some major trends in the amounts and types of solutes. The major inorganic solutes are the cations (positive ions) sodium, potassium, calcium, and magnesium and the anions (negative ions) chloride, sulphate, and bicarbonate/carbonate. When the total concentration of all these ions (i.e., the salinity, or salt content) is less than 3 grams per litre (i.e., 3 grams per kilogram, or 3 parts per thousand [ 0/00]), inland waters are conventionally regarded as fresh. Most fresh waters have salinities less than 0.5 gram per litre and are dominated by calcium, magnesium, and bicarbonate or carbonate ions. Conventionally, saline waters are defined as those that have salinities greater than 3 grams per litre, with maximum values determined by the dominant type of ions present. Sodium and chloride ions are dominant in most but not all salt lakes, and maximum salinities are therefore about 350 grams per litre. In addition to these major ions, all inland waters contain smaller quantities of other ions, of which phosphate and nitrate—essential plant nutrients—are particularly significant. Also of biological significance are certain dissolved gases, especially oxygen, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen, whose solubilities are inversely correlated with temperature, altitude, and salinity. Hydrion concentrations (pH) and concentrations of a variety of dissolved organic compounds of undetermined significance affect the biota as well.
Physicochemical phenomena affect every body of inland water, creating unique relationships among and within the biotic and abiotic components of the ecosystem. Of particular interest are the pathways or biogeochemical cycles that are traveled by the chemical elements essential to life—nitrogen, phosphorus, carbon, and a variety of micronutrients such as iron, sulfur, and silica (see biosphere: The organism and the environment: Resources of the biosphere: Nutrient cycling). The degree to which output of a particular element balances input within a given aquatic ecosystem varies according to the type of inland water involved. However, all essential elements follow pathways in inland waters that are numerous, complex, well-defined, and often interdependent on other biogeochemical cycles. In fact, a defining characteristic of all inland aquatic ecosystems, including the most simple temporary bodies of highly saline water, is the occurrence of well-defined biogeochemical cycles.
Some of the most salient general physicochemical features of inland waters having been indicated, it is important to emphasize that these features are expressed differently in various types of inland waters.