Our outdoor mesocosm experiment was established between June 2020 and August 2020 at Balaton Limnological Institute (N 46°54'48. 5", E 17°53'33. 9"). Our study mainly focused on the response of the zooplankton to warming and heat wave - these phenomena have become more popular in Europe nowadays. The facility consisted of 12 mesocosms, each with a maximum volume of 5000 L. Before two days at the beginning of this study, to achieve the natural plankton of the lake, mesocosms were filled water directly from lake Balaton - one of the biggest freshwater lakes in Europe with an average depth of 3. 5 m (Kutics, 2019). Water level was set to 120 cm, which resulted in an experimental volume of 3000 L. Three types of treatment were assigned to the twelve mesocosms with four replicates each: (1) ambient environmental condition (control); (2) a constant elevation of 3°C above the ambient water temperature (constant +3°C) for four week and (3) one- week heat wave treatment with an increasing temperature of 6 °C above the ambient water temperature (heat wave +6 °C) in the first and the third week. These treatments mimicking the predicted climate scenarios by the end of the twenty-first century, lake heatwaves will get hotter and longer.
Our outdoor
mesocosm
experiment
was established
between June 2020 and August 2020 at Balaton
Limnological
Institute (N 46°54'48. 5", E 17°53'33. 9"). Our study
mainly
focused on the response of the zooplankton to warming and heat wave
-
these phenomena have become more popular in Europe nowadays. The facility consisted of 12
mesocosms
, each with a maximum volume of 5000 L.
Before
two days at the beginning of this study, to achieve the natural plankton of the
lake
,
mesocosms
were filled
water
directly
from
lake
Balaton
-
one of the biggest freshwater
lakes
in Europe with an average depth of 3. 5 m (
Kutics
, 2019).
Water
level
was set
to 120 cm, which resulted in an experimental volume of 3000 L. Three types of treatment
were assigned
to the twelve
mesocosms
with four replicates each: (1) ambient environmental condition (control); (2) a constant elevation of
3°C
above the ambient
water
temperature (constant +
3°C
) for four
week
and (3) one- week heat wave treatment with an increasing temperature of 6 °C above the ambient
water
temperature (heat wave +6 °C) in the
first
and the third week. These treatments mimicking the predicted climate scenarios by the
end
of the twenty-
first
century,
lake
heatwaves will
get
hotter and longer.