Potential impacts of climate change on flow regime and fish habitat in mountain rivers of the south-western Balkans

• Published in: The Science of the total environment Vol. 540; pp. 418 - 428
• Main Authors: Papadaki, Christina, Soulis, Konstantinos, Muñoz-Mas, Rafael, Martinez-Capel, Francisco, Zogaris, Stamatis, Ntoanidis, Lazaros, Dimitriou, Elias
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 01.01.2016
• Subjects: Alterations; Animals; Balkan Peninsula; Climate; Climate Change; Computer simulation; Ecosystem; Environmental Monitoring; Fish; Freshwater; Habitat series analysis; Habitats; Hydrological alteration; Hydrology; Models, Theoretical; Mountains; Physical habitat simulation; Rivers; Rivers - chemistry; Salmo; Trout; Water Movements; West Balkan trout; Balkan Peninsula; Europe, Balkans; Europe, West Balkans; MED, Western Mediterranean; MED; Europe, Balkans Mts; West Balkan trout; Hydrological alteration; Habitat series analysis; Physical habitat simulation
• ISSN: 0048-9697; 1879-1026
• DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2015.06.134

The climate change in the Mediterranean area is expected to have significant impacts on the aquatic ecosystems and particular in the mountain rivers and streams that often host important species such as the Salmo farioides, Karaman 1938. These impacts will most possibly affect the habitat availability for various aquatic species resulting to an essential alteration of the water requirements, either for dams or other water abstractions, in order to maintain the essential levels of ecological flow for the rivers. The main scope of this study was to assess potential climate change impacts on the hydrological patterns and typical biota for a south-western Balkan mountain river, the Acheloos. The altered flow regimes under different emission scenarios of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were estimated using a hydrological model and based on regional climate simulations over the study area. The Indicators of Hydrologic Alteration (IHA) methodology was then used to assess the potential streamflow alterations in the studied river due to predicted climate change conditions. A fish habitat simulation method integrating univariate habitat suitability curves and hydraulic modeling techniques were used to assess the impacts on the relationships between the aquatic biota and hydrological status utilizing a sentinel species, the West Balkan trout. The most prominent effects of the climate change scenarios depict severe flow reductions that are likely to occur especially during the summer flows, changing the duration and depressing the magnitude of the natural low flow conditions. Weighted Usable Area-flow curves indicated the limitation of suitable habitat for the native trout. Finally, this preliminary application highlighted the potential of science-based hydrological and habitat simulation approaches that are relevant to both biological quality elements (fish) and current EU Water policy to serve as efficient tools for the estimation of possible climate change impacts on the south-western Balkan river ecosystems. [Display omitted] •South-western Balkan mountain streams were found sensitive to climate fluctuations•Climate fluctuations will seriously affect mountainous stream habitat diversity•Climate fluctuations will affect West Balkan trout, but also other biota•Medium sized West Balkan trout will be mostly affected by climate fluctuations•The results obtain could be applied to similar mountainous regions communities of Balkan