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Dynamics of total suspended matter and phytoplankton loads in the river Elbe

  • Physical and Ecological Aspects of Mobile Sediments
  • Published:
Journal of Soils and Sediments Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

Identifying sources and fluxes of suspended matter within the catchment is vitally important for the water quality of rivers and for establishing sediment management plans. Constituents of suspended particles are of abiotic and biotic origin. In the Elbe, the biotic fraction of suspended particles is mainly composed of phytoplankton biomass. In this study, total seston and phytoplankton are analyzed for their seasonality, their interdependence and temporal trends over three or five decades, respectively.

Materials and methods

The biotic load was separated from the total suspended matter load, and time series of total suspended substances (seston) (1964 to 2015) and chlorophyll a values (1985 to 2015) were analyzed. Our analyses focused on the seasonal dynamics, long-term trends, and the correlation to hydrological events.

Results and discussion

The mean share of phytoplankton in total seston accounted for 24% in summer months (April–September), with a negative correlation between discharge and total seston, and 11% in winter months (October–March), with a weak positive correlation between discharge and total seston. The long-term trend of seston load was decreasing, while phytoplankton load did not show a significant trend.

Conclusions

Autochthonous biogenic portions should not be neglected in the budget of total suspended matter loads in the Elbe catchment. Our results indicate that land-use and industrial changes subsequent to the German reunification mainly caused the observed trend. Phytoplankton growth superimposes the seasonal dynamics of seston in summer, whereas in the long term, decreasing mineral fraction dominates the significantly decreasing trend.

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Acknowledgments

This research has been carried out in the projects 5.01 “Climate projections for sediment balances and risks due to cohesive sediments” and 5.02 “Impacts of climate change on nutrient and phytoplankton dynamics in navigable rivers” within the departmental research program “KLIWAS—impacts of climate change on waterways and navigation,” financed by the German Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI).

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Author notes

  1. Gudrun Hillebrand and Paulin Hardenbicker contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department Groundwater, Geology, River Morphology, Federal Institute of Hydrology, Koblenz, Germany

    Gudrun Hillebrand, Wilfried Otto & Stefan Vollmer

  2. Department Ecological Interactions, Federal Institute of Hydrology, Koblenz, Germany

    Paulin Hardenbicker & Helmut Fischer

Authors
  1. Gudrun Hillebrand
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  2. Paulin Hardenbicker
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  3. Helmut Fischer
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  4. Wilfried Otto
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Correspondence to Gudrun Hillebrand.

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Responsible editor: Sabine Ulrike Gerbersdorf

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Hillebrand, G., Hardenbicker, P., Fischer, H. et al. Dynamics of total suspended matter and phytoplankton loads in the river Elbe. J Soils Sediments 18, 3104–3113 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-018-1943-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-018-1943-1

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