IISD Experimental Lakes Area LTER: Phytoplankton Abundance, Biomass, and Community Structure, 1969 – 2024

The IISD Experimental Lakes Area (IISD-ELA) LTER Phytoplankton Abundance, Biomass, and Community Structure data package provides data on phytoplankton from five long-term reference lakes (Lake 114, Lake 224, Lake 239, Lake 373, and Lake 442) in northwestern Ontario, Canada. The data package includes metadata and tabular data.
Metadata include a lake information table (lake names, locations, morphometric data) and an HTML information sheet that describes the data package and includes methods, a data dictionary, and references. Tabular data include: phytoplankton biomass summarized at the Division (Cyanobacteria) or Class (chlorophyceae, euglenophyceae, chrysophyceae, bacillariophyceae, cryptophyceae, dinophyceae) level of taxonomic resolution ("Group"); phytoplankton abundance and biomass at the lowest level of taxonomic resolution (usually species level); phytoplankton species codes that act as a primary key linking the previous tables to current scientific names; and the phytoplankton trophic feeding type that partitions taxa into functional feeding groups (autotrophic, heterotrophic, mixotrophic).
The data package is ongoing – updated data will be provided as data are collected from these long-term reference lakes in subsequent years. If data are not present for the lake you are interested in (e.g. if the lake was part of an experiment rather than a reference lake) please get in touch with us.