Data from: Phenology in freshwaters: a review and recommendations for future research

Phenology
changes are increasingly recognized as a common response of species to ongoing
global change. Phenology can be influenced by environmental cues that impact
the initiation or duration of life history events as
well as intrinsic organismal traits
that may affect how different species respond to
such environmental cues. Despite the importance of phenology for biodiversity conservation as demonstrated by
terrestrial and marine research, freshwater phenology
is understudied. Therefore, we conducted a literature review on freshwater
phenology research to summarize the spatial, taxonomic, and temporal biases of
studies; as well as relationships between phenology metrics, environmental
cues, and intrinsic species traits studied in these systems. We find that
phenology research in freshwaters may be limited by a lack of long-term
time-series data, especially in lotic habitats. Phenology metrics studied
differed between lotic and lentic habitats, with limnological research focused
on planktonic population growth whereas macroinvertebrate emergence and fish
spawning seasons are the most frequently studied aspects of phenology in
streams and rivers. Across habitats, temperature is the most investigated environmental cue, with additional research attention to resources and hydrology in
influencing phenology events in lentic and lotic environments, respectively.
Knowledge gaps in contemporary freshwater phenology research include
relationships between phenology and environmental cues in tropical systems,
understanding of non-salmonid fish phenology, and testing hypotheses related to
intrinsic traits. We recommend that future research broaden the biological,
spatial and temporal scales of phenology studies in these systems, and make use
of novel data sources, methods, and technologies to address contemporary
research gaps.