TippingPond bacterioplankton. TippingPond

Ponds and shallow lakes are very important for regional biodiversity and strongly contribute to ecosystem services such as carbon storage, recreation and fish production. In addition, they are excellent model systems in ecology, and have played a key role in the development of theory on regime shifts in ecosystems, where initial resilience to environmental change leads to catastrophic regime shifts when a disturbance threshold is surpassed. Upon eutrophication or with temperature increase, ponds and lakes may show a shift from a clear-water to a turbid state with an associated decline in biodiversity and ecosystem services.TIPPINGPOND engages in a combined survey and manipulative study to identify the link between extant biodiversity and resilience to disturbance in pond ecosystems and early warning signs of regime shifts that lead to a strong decline in biodiversity and ecosystem services. Field experiments and studies will take place in Belgium, France and Sweden, on natural lakes and ponds.