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Drivers and Changes of the Poyang Lake Wetland Ecosystem

  • Special Issue on Lake Poyang
  • Published:
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Abstract

This paper serves as both a review of the latest science on the Poyang Lake wetland ecosystem and as an introduction to this Special Issue guest-edited by Jun Xu. Poyang Lake is the largest freshwater lake in China and one of the largest freshwater lake/wetland complexes in Asia. Poyang Lake’s associated floodplain wetlands play a critical role for regional and global biodiversity conservation, particularly wintering migratory birds. Since the Three Gorges Dam became operative in 2003, the magnitude and frequency of extreme seasonal water-level fluctuations in Poyang Lake have increased significantly. We review the existing literature and contributions to this Special Issue on the Poyang Lake wetland ecosystem and their biota in relation to impacts from the Three Gorges Dam. Resulting impacts on, and adaptations of, Poyang Lake biota to the hydrological changes caused by operation of the dam are poorly understood. Adaptive management of this lake and its associated wetlands needs to be further assessed through comprehensive, long-term monitoring covering a wide range of parameters related to the system’s hydrological characteristics, water quality, geomorphology, aquatic biota, wetland vegetation, and associated wetland fauna.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2018YFD0900904 and 2017YFC0405303), and the National Natural Science Foundations of China (Grant No. 31872687, 41301077, 41501100 and 31370473). J.G.M. is funded by the “Tenure-Track System Promotion Program” of the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Nature Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, 10083, People’s Republic of China

    Yuyu Wang & Linlu Shi

  2. Arctic Research Center, Hokkaido University, N21W11, Kita-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido, 001-0021, Japan

    Jorge García Molinos

  3. College of Fisheries, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, People’s Republic of China

    Min Zhang

  4. State Key Laboratory of Lake Science and Environment, Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, 210008, People’s Republic of China

    Zhaoshi Wu

  5. School of Life Sciences, Key Laboratory of Poyang Lake Environment and Resource Utilization, Ministry of Education, Nanchang University, Nanchang, 330031, People’s Republic of China

    Huan Zhang

  6. Donghu Experimental Station of Lake Ecosystems, State Key Laboratory of Freshwater Ecology and Biotechnology of China, Institute of Hydrobiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430072, People’s Republic of China

    Jun Xu

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  1. Yuyu Wang
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  2. Jorge García Molinos
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  3. Linlu Shi
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  4. Min Zhang
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Correspondence to Jun Xu.

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Wang, Y., Molinos, J.G., Shi, L. et al. Drivers and Changes of the Poyang Lake Wetland Ecosystem. Wetlands 39 (Suppl 1), 35–44 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-019-01180-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-019-01180-9

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