TY - JOUR A1 - Irob, Katja A1 - Blaum, Niels A1 - Baldauf, Selina A1 - Kerger, Leon A1 - Strohbach, Ben A1 - Kanduvarisa, Angelina A1 - Lohmann, Dirk A1 - Tietjen, Britta T1 - Browsing herbivores improve the state and functioning of savannas BT - A model assessment of alternative land-use strategies JF - Ecology and evolution N2 - Changing climatic conditions and unsustainable land use are major threats to savannas worldwide. Historically, many African savannas were used intensively for livestock grazing, which contributed to widespread patterns of bush encroachment across savanna systems. To reverse bush encroachment, it has been proposed to change the cattle-dominated land use to one dominated by comparatively specialized browsers and usually native herbivores. However, the consequences for ecosystem properties and processes remain largely unclear. We used the ecohydrological, spatially explicit model EcoHyD to assess the impacts of two contrasting, herbivore land-use strategies on a Namibian savanna: grazer- versus browser-dominated herbivore communities. We varied the densities of grazers and browsers and determined the resulting composition and diversity of the plant community, total vegetation cover, soil moisture, and water use by plants. Our results showed that plant types that are less palatable to herbivores were best adapted to grazing or browsing animals in all simulated densities. Also, plant types that had a competitive advantage under limited water availability were among the dominant ones irrespective of land-use scenario. Overall, the results were in line with our expectations: under high grazer densities, we found heavy bush encroachment and the loss of the perennial grass matrix. Importantly, regardless of the density of browsers, grass cover and plant functional diversity were significantly higher in browsing scenarios. Browsing herbivores increased grass cover, and the higher total cover in turn improved water uptake by plants overall. We concluded that, in contrast to grazing-dominated land-use strategies, land-use strategies dominated by browsing herbivores, even at high herbivore densities, sustain diverse vegetation communities with high cover of perennial grasses, resulting in lower erosion risk and bolstering ecosystem services. KW - browsing KW - ecohydrology KW - land use KW - plant community KW - savanna KW - wildlife KW - management Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.8715 SN - 2045-7758 VL - 12 IS - 3 PB - Wiley CY - Hoboken ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hunke, Philip A1 - Müller, Eva Nora A1 - Schröder-Esselbach, Boris A1 - Zeilhofer, Peter T1 - The Brazilian Cerrado: assessment of water and soil degradation in catchments under intensive agricultural use JF - Ecohydrology : ecosystems, land and water process interactions, ecohydrogeomorphology N2 - The Brazilian Cerrado is recognized as one of the most threatened biomes in the world, as the region has experienced a striking change from natural Cerrado vegetation to intense cash crop production. This paper reviews the history of land conversion in the Cerrado and the development of soil properties and water resources under past and ongoing land use. We compared soil and water quality parameters from different land uses considering 80 soil and 18 water studies conducted in different regions across the Cerrado to provide quantitative evidence of soil and water alterations from land use change. Following the conversion of native Cerrado, significant effects on soil pH, bulk density and available P and K for croplands and less-pronounced effects on pastures were evident. Soil total N did not differ between land uses because most of the sites classified as croplands were nitrogen-fixing soybeans, which are not artificially fertilized with N. In contrast, water quality studies showed nitrogen enrichment in agricultural catchments, indicating fertilizer impacts and potential susceptibility to eutrophication. Regardless of the land use, P is widely absent because of the high-fixing capacities of deeply weathered soils and the filtering capacity of riparian vegetation. Pesticides, however, were consistently detected throughout the entire aquatic system. In several case studies, extremely high-peak concentrations exceeded Brazilian and European Union (EU) water quality limits, which were potentially accompanied by serious health implications. Land use intensification is likely to continue, particularly in regions where less annual rainfall and severe droughts are projected in the northeastern and western Cerrado. Thus, the leaching risk and displacement of agrochemicals are expected to increase, particularly because the current legislation has caused a reduction in riparian vegetation. We conclude that land use intensification is likely to seriously limit the Cerrado's future regarding both agricultural productivity and ecosystem stability. Because only limited data are available, we recommend further field studies to understand the interaction between terrestrial and aquatic systems. This study may serve as a valuable database for integrated modelling to investigate the impact of land use and climate change on soil and water resources and to test and develop mitigation measures for the Cerrado. Copyright (C) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. KW - Cerrado KW - land degradation KW - ecosystem change KW - water quality KW - soil parameters KW - ecohydrology KW - land use change KW - Mato Grosso KW - pesticides KW - cash crops Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/eco.1573 SN - 1936-0584 SN - 1936-0592 VL - 8 IS - 6 SP - 1154 EP - 1180 PB - Wiley-Blackwell CY - Hoboken ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Zimmermann, Alexander A1 - Uber, Magdalena A1 - Zimmermann, Beate A1 - Levia, Delphis F. T1 - Predictability of stemflow in a species-rich tropical forest JF - Hydrological processes N2 - Numerous studies investigated the influence of abiotic (meteorological conditions) and biotic factors (tree characteristics) on stemflow generation. Although these studies identified the variables that influence stemflow volumes in simply structured forests, the combination of tree characteristics that allows a robust prediction of stemflow volumes in species-rich forests is not well known. Many hydrological applications, however, require at least a rough estimate of stemflow volumes based on the characteristics of a forest stand. The need for robust predictions of stemflow motivated us to investigate the relationships between tree characteristics and stemflow volumes in a species-rich tropical forest located in central Panama. Based on a sampling setup consisting of ten rainfall collectors, 300 throughfall samplers and 60 stemflow collectors and cumulated data comprising 26 rain events, we derive three main findings. Firstly, stemflow represents a minor hydrological component in the studied 1-ha forest patch (1.0% of cumulated rainfall). Secondly, in the studied species-rich forest, single tree characteristics are only weakly related to stemflow volumes. The influence of multiple tree parameters (e.g. crown diameter, presence of large epiphytes and inclination of branches) and the dependencies among these parameters require a multivariate approach to understand the generation of stemflow. Thirdly, predicting stemflow in species-rich forests based on tree parameters is a difficult task. Although our best model can capture the variation in stemflow to some degree, a critical validation reveals that the model cannot provide robust predictions of stemflow. A reanalysis of data from previous studies in species-rich forests corroborates this finding. Based on these results and considering that for most hydrological applications, stemflow is only one parameter among others to estimate, we advocate using the base model, i.e. the mean of the stemflow data, to quantify stemflow volumes for a given study area. Studies in species-rich forests that wish to obtain predictions of stemflow based on tree parameters probably need to conduct a much more extensive sampling than currently implemented by most studies. Copyright (c) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. KW - stemflow KW - rainfall partitioning KW - multivariate regression KW - tropical lowland rainforest KW - ecohydrology Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.10554 SN - 0885-6087 SN - 1099-1085 VL - 29 IS - 23 SP - 4947 EP - 4956 PB - Wiley-Blackwell CY - Hoboken ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Lohmann, Dirk A1 - Tietjen, Britta A1 - Blaum, Niels A1 - Joubert, David F. A1 - Jeltsch, Florian T1 - Shifting thresholds and changing degradation patterns: climate change effects on the simulated long-term response of a semi-arid savanna to grazing JF - Journal of applied ecology : an official journal of the British Ecological Society N2 - 1. The complex, nonlinear response of dryland systems to grazing and climatic variations is a challenge to management of these lands. Predicted climatic changes will impact the desertification of drylands under domestic livestock production. Consequently, there is an urgent need to understand the response of drylands to grazing under climate change. 2. We enhanced and parameterized an ecohydrological savanna model to assess the impacts of a range of climate change scenarios on the response of a semi-arid African savanna to grazing. We focused on the effects of temperature and CO2 level increase in combination with changes in inter- and intra-annual precipitation patterns on the long-term dynamics of three major plant functional types. 3. We found that the capacity of the savanna to sustain livestock grazing was strongly influenced by climate change. Increased mean annual precipitation and changes in intra-annual precipitation pattern have the potential to slightly increase carrying capacities of the system. In contrast, decreased precipitation, higher interannual variation and temperature increase are leading to a severe decline of carrying capacities owing to losses of the perennial grass biomass. 4. Semi-arid rangelands will be at lower risk of shrub encroachment and encroachment will be less intense under future climatic conditions. This finding holds in spite of elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 and irrespective of changes in precipitation pattern, because of the drought sensitivity of germination and establishment of encroaching species. 5. Synthesis and applications. Changes in livestock carrying capacities, both positive and negative, mainly depend on the highly uncertain future rainfall conditions. However, independent of the specific changes, shrub encroachment becomes less likely and in many cases less severe. Thus, managers of semi-arid rangelands should shift their focus from woody vegetation towards perennial grass species as indicators for rangeland degradation. Furthermore, the resulting reduced competition from woody vegetation has the potential to facilitate ecosystem restoration measures such as re-introduction of desirable plant species that are only little promising or infeasible under current climatic conditions. On a global scale, the reductions in standing biomass resulting from altered degradation dynamics of semi-arid rangelands can have negative impacts on carbon sequestration. KW - CO2 increase KW - demographic bottleneck KW - ecohydrology KW - grid-based simulation model KW - livestock KW - precipitation pattern KW - savanna resilience KW - shrub encroachment KW - soil moisture KW - sustainable rangeland management Y1 - 2012 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2664.2012.02157.x SN - 0021-8901 VL - 49 IS - 4 SP - 814 EP - 823 PB - Wiley-Blackwell CY - Hoboken ER - TY - THES A1 - Hunke, Philip Paul T1 - The Brazilian Cerrado: ecohydrological assessment of water and soil degradation in heavily modified meso-scale catchments T1 - Der brasilianische Cerrado: ökohydrologische Analyse von Boden- und Wasserdegradierung in intensiv landwirtschaftlich genutzten mesoskaligen Einzugsgebieten N2 - The Brazilian Cerrado is recognised as one of the most threatened biomes in the world, as the region has experienced a striking change from natural vegetation to intense cash crop production. The impacts of rapid agricultural expansion on soil and water resources are still poorly understood in the region. Therefore, the overall aim of the thesis is to improve our understanding of the ecohydrological processes causing water and soil degradation in the Brazilian Cerrado. I first present a metaanalysis to provide quantitative evidence and identifying the main impacts of soil and water alterations resulting from land use change. Second, field studies were conducted to (i) examine the effects of land use change on soils of natural cerrado transformed to common croplands and pasture and (ii) indicate how agricultural production affects water quality across a meso-scale catchment. Third, the ecohydrological process-based model SWAT was tested with simple scenario analyses to gain insight into the impacts of land use and climate change on the water cycling in the upper São Lourenço catchment which experienced decreasing discharges in the last 40 years. Soil and water quality parameters from different land uses were extracted from 89 soil and 18 water studies in different regions across the Cerrado. Significant effects on pH, bulk density and available P and K for croplands and less-pronounced effects on pastures were evident. Soil total N did not differ between land uses because most of the cropland sites were N-fixing soybean cultivations, which are not artificially fertilized with N. By contrast, water quality studies showed N enrichment in agricultural catchments, indicating fertilizer impacts and potential susceptibility to eutrophication. Regardless of the land use, P is widely absent because of the high-fixing capacities of deeply weathered soils and the filtering capacity of riparian vegetation. Pesticides, however, were consistently detected throughout the entire aquatic system. In several case studies, extremely high-peak concentrations exceeded Brazilian and EU water quality limits, which pose serious health risks. My field study revealed that land conversion caused a significant reduction in infiltration rates near the soil surface of pasture (–96 %) and croplands (–90 % to –93 %). Soil aggregate stability was significantly reduced in croplands than in cerrado and pasture. Soybean crops had extremely high extractable P (80 mg kg–1), whereas pasture N levels declined. A snapshot water sampling showed strong seasonality in water quality parameters. Higher temperature, oxi-reduction potential (ORP), NO2–, and very low oxygen concentrations (<5 mg•l–1) and saturation (<60 %) were recorded during the rainy season. By contrast, remarkably high PO43– concentrations (up to 0.8 mg•l–1) were measured during the dry season. Water quality parameters were affected by agricultural activities at all sampled sub-catchments across the catchment, regardless of stream characteristic. Direct NO3– leaching appeared to play a minor role; however, water quality is affected by topsoil fertiliser inputs with impact on small low order streams and larger rivers. Land conversion leaving cropland soils more susceptible to surface erosion by increased overland flow events. In a third study, the field data were used to parameterise SWAT. The model was tested with different input data and calibrated in SWAT-CUP using the SUFI-2 algorithm. The model was judged reliable to simulate the water balance in the Cerrado. A complete cerrado, pasture and cropland cover was used to analyse the impact of land use on water cycling as well as climate change projections (2039–2058) according to the projections of the RCP 8.5 scenario. The actual evapotranspiration (ET) for the cropland scenario was higher compared to the cerrado cover (+100 mm a–1). Land use change scenarios confirmed that deforestation caused higher annual ET rates explaining partly the trend of decreased streamflow. Taking all climate change scenarios into account, the most likely effect is a prolongation of the dry season (by about one month), with higher peak flows in the rainy season. Consequently, potential threats for crop production with lower soil moisture and increased erosion and sediment transport during the rainy season are likely and should be considered in adaption plans. From the three studies of the thesis I conclude that land use intensification is likely to seriously limit the Cerrado’s future regarding both agricultural productivity and ecosystem stability. Because only limited data are available for the vast biome, we recommend further field studies to understand the interaction between terrestrial and aquatic systems. This thesis may serve as a valuable database for integrated modelling to investigate the impact of land use and climate change on soil and water resources and to test and develop mitigation measures for the Cerrado in the future. N2 - Ökohydrologische Interaktionen in Folge von exzessiver Bodenerosion auf landwirtschaftlich stark modifizierten Flächen können speziell in tropischen Gebieten einen großen Einfluss auf die Fruchtbarkeit und zukünftige Nutzbarkeit der Böden haben, wie dies im Cerrado geschieht. Der brasilianische Cerrado ist eine neotropische Savanne und stellt mit 2 Mio. km² das zweitgrößte Biom Südamerikas dar. Das Biom wird global unter den bedeutendsten aber auch meist gefährdetsten 25 Biodiversitätshotspots gelistet. Ein extremer Landnutzungswandel führt dazu, dass der Cerrado zu den weltweit bedeutendsten landwirtschaftlichen Gebieten zählt und mittlerweile > 50 % des Bioms abgeholzt sind. Durch staatliche Subventionsprogramme, Aufkalkung und Düngung der Böden werden mehrere Ernten (v.a. Soja, Mais, Zuckerrohr und Baumwolle) pro Jahr bei hohem Ertrag realisiert. Aufgrund weniger Untersuchungen ist bisher unklar, wie sich die Landnutzungsintensivierung mit dem Einsatz großer Mengen an Agrochemikalien auf die Boden- und Wasserressourcen auswirkt. Um die Zielsetzung zu erreichen, wurden in einer umfassenden Metaanalyse Boden- und Wasserqualitätsparameter von mehr als 100 Einzelstudien analysiert, mehrere Feldkampagnen zur Erhebung bodenphysikochemischer und Wasserqualitätsparameter für unterschiedliche Landnutzungen durchgeführt und Modellierungen mit SWAT zur Abschätzung des Landnutzungs- und Klimawandels vorgenommen. Die Literaturanalyse konnte zeigen, dass Erosion, Veränderungen des Nährstoffkreislaufs, Nährstoffanreicherungen und sehr hohe Pestizidkonzentrationen in den Gewässern des gesamten Cerrado auftreten, mit stärkster Ausprägung für Ackerflächen. Trotz hoher Düngemengen wird festgestellt, dass P nur in sehr geringen Konzentrationen in den Gewässern nachgewiesen wird, welches auf die P-Fixierung der Böden und die Filterleistung der Uferrandstreifen zurückzuführen ist. In einer Feldstudie bestätigen sich die Ergebnisse, dass der Landnutzungswandel zu deutlichen Änderungen der boden-physikochemischen Parameter führt, wie z.B. einer signifikanten Abnahme der hydraulischen Leitfähigkeit (> –90 %) und der Bodenaggregatstabilität. Außerdem werden erhöhte pH-Werte und Überdüngung anzeigende P und K-gehalte im Oberboden (9-fach natürlicher Hintergrund) mit der stärksten Ausprägung unter Soja gemessen. Die Niederschlagsintensitäten überschreiten die Infiltrationskapazität der landwirtschaftlich genutzten Böden, wodurch es zu erhöhtem Oberflächenabfluss, Bodenerosionsereignissen mit Gullyformierungen kommt und der Eintrag von Agrochemikalien in die zuvor pristinen Gewässer begünstigt wird. Verglichen mit natürlichen Gewässern konnten im gesamten Einzugsgebiet niedrigere O2-Werte (< 5 mg l–1) sowie erhöhte NO3– (0.5 mg l–1), NO2– (0.1 mg l–1) und in der Trockenzeit auf direkte Düngung zurückzuführende sehr hohe PO43– (0.8 mg l–1) Konzentrationen festgestellt werden. Da in den Bodenprofilen keine Tiefenakkumulation von NPK nachgewiesen wurde ist davon auszugehen, dass Dünger durch Oberflächenabflussprozesse in das Flusssystem gelangen. Auch wenn die Nährstoffkonzentrationen nach europäischen Maßstäben gering sind, ist anzunehmen, dass in einem nährstofflimitierten System wie dem Cerrado die um ein vielfach erhöhte Konzentration der natürlichen Hintergrundwerte den Metabolismus der Gewässer negativ beeinflusst. In einer dritten Studie wird mit SWAT untersucht wie sich der Landnutzungs- und Klimawandel auf die Wasserbilanz auswirkt. In Testläufen zeigt sich, dass sowohl die verwendeten Niederschlagseingangsdaten als auch die Vegetationsparameter des natürlichen Cerrados von hoher Relevanz sind. Die Simulation verschiedener Landnutzungsszenarien belegt, dass die im Gebiet beobachteten abnehmenden Abflüsse auf die Zunahme landwirtschaftlicher Produktion und einer damit einhergehenden Zunahme der Evapotranspiration zurückzuführen sind. Die Simulation extremer Klimaszenarien (RCP 8.5 2039-2058) verdeutlicht, dass sich die Trockenzeit verlängert, welches Auswirkungen auf die Aussaattermine haben könnte. Gleichzeitig nehmen die Spitzenabflüsse in der Regenzeit zu, welches ohne entsprechende Gegenmaßnahmen zu erhöhter Erosion und gesteigertem Nähr- und Schadstofftransport in die Gewässer führt. Kombiniert mit einer weiteren Landnutzungsintensivierung wird für die zukünftige Entwicklung des Cerrado geschlussfolgert, dass die Veränderungen des Wasser- und Nährstoffhaushalt durch die Landwirtschaft und die damit einhergehenden Degradierungserscheinungen die Produktivität und Ökosystemstabilität nicht dauerhaft gewährleisten werden können. Die vorliegende Dissertation liefert einen zentralen Beitrag zur ökohydrologischen Bewertung des Status quo und der zukünftigen Entwicklung des brasilianischen Cerrados. Sie kann einen Ausgangspunkt für weitere Forschungen und Modellierungen darstellen, um die in dieser Arbeit benannten offenen Fragen hinsichtlich der ökohydrologischen Interaktionen zu klären. KW - Cerrado KW - ecohydrology KW - water KW - soil KW - deforestation KW - Cerrado KW - Ökohydrologie KW - Landnutzung KW - Boden KW - Wasser Y1 - 2015 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-85110 ER - TY - THES A1 - Hattermann, Fred Fokko T1 - Integrated modelling of Global Change impacts in the German Elbe River Basin T1 - Integrierte Modellierung der Auswirkungen des Globalen Wandels auf den deutschen Teil des Elbeinzugsgebietes N2 - The scope of this study is to investigate the environmental change in the German part of the Elbe river basin, whereby the focus is on two water related problems: having too little water and having water of poor quality. The Elbe region is representative of humid to semi-humid landscapes in central Europe, where water availability during the summer season is the limiting factor for plant growth and crop yields, especially in the loess areas, where the annual precipitation is lower than 500 mm. It is most likely that water quantity problems will accelerate in future, because both the observed and the projected climate trend show an increase in temperature and a decrease in annual precipitation, especially in the summer. Another problem is nutrient pollution of rivers and lakes. In the early 1990s, the Elbe was one of the most heavily polluted rivers in Europe. Even though nutrient emissions from point sources have notably decreased in the basin due to reduction of industrial sources and introduction of new and improved sewage treatment facilities, the diffuse sources of pollution are still not sufficiently controlled. The investigations have been done using the eco-hydrological model SWIM (Soil and Water Integrated Model), which has been embedded in a model framework of climate and agro-economic models. A global scenario of climate and agro-economic change has been regionalized to generate transient climate forcing data and land use boundary conditions for the model. The model was used to transform the climate and land use changes into altered evapotranspiration, groundwater recharge, crop yields and river discharge, and to investigate the development of water quality in the river basin. Particular emphasis was given to assessing the significance of the impacts on the hydrology, taking into account in the analysis the inherent uncertainty of the regional climate change as well as the uncertainty in the results of the model. The average trend of the regional climate change scenario indicates a decrease in mean annual precipitation up to 2055 of about 1.5 %, but with high uncertainty (covering the range from -15.3 % to +14.8 %), and a less uncertain increase in temperature of approximately 1.4 K. The relatively small change in precipitation in conjunction with the change in temperature leads to severe impacts on groundwater recharge and river flow. Increasing temperature induces longer vegetation periods, and the seasonality of the flow regime changes towards longer low flow spells in summer. As a results the water availability will decrease on average of the scenario simulations by approximately 15 %. The increase in temperatures will improve the growth conditions for temperature limited crops like maize. The uncertainty of the climate trend is particularly high in regions where the change is the highest. The simulation results for the Nuthe subbasin of the Elbe indicate that retention processes in groundwater, wetlands and riparian zones have a high potential to reduce the nitrate concentrations of rivers and lakes in the basin, because they are located at the interface between catchment area and surface water bodies, where they are controlling the diffuse nutrient inputs. The relatively high retention of nitrate in the Nuthe basin is due to the long residence time of water in the subsurface (about 40 years), with good conditions for denitrification, and due to nitrate retention and plant uptake in wetlands and riparian zones. The concluding result of the study is that the natural environment and communities in parts of Central Europe will have considerably lower water resources under scenario conditions. The water quality will improve, but due to the long residence time of water and nutrients in the subsurface, this improvement will be slower in areas where the conditions for nutrient turn-over in the subsurface are poor. N2 - Ziel der vorliegenden Arbeit ist die Untersuchung der Auswirkungen des Globalen Wandels auf den Wasserkreislauf im deutschen Teil des Elbeeinzugsgebietes. Der Fokus liegt dabei auf Wassermengen- und Wasserqualitätsproblemen. Die Elbe liegt im Zentrum Europas im Übergangsbereich zwischen ozeanischen und kontinentalen Klimaten, wo die Wasserverfügbarkeit in den Sommermonaten den limitierenden Faktor für das Pflanzenwachstum und die landwirtschaftlichen Erträge bildet. Dies gilt insbesondere für die Lössgebiete im Lee des Harzes, wo die jährlichen Niederschläge unter 500 mm liegen. Es ist sehr wahrscheinlich, dass sich die Wassermengenprobleme in Zukunft noch verstärken werden, denn sowohl das beobachtete als auch das für die Zukunft projizierte Klima in der Region zeigen höhere Temperaturen und fallende Niederschläge, besonders im Sommer. Ein weiteres Problem ist die hohe Nährstoffbelastung der Flüsse und Seen im Elbeeinzugsgebiet. Anfang der neunziger Jahre war die Elbe eine der am stärksten belasteten Flüsse in Europa. Obwohl die Einträge besonders aus Punktquellen durch den Rückgang der Industrie und den Bau von neuen Kläranlagen seitdem gefallen sind, gelangen trotzdem noch große Nährstoffmengen aus diffusen Quellen in die Gewässer. Die Untersuchungen wurden unter Anwendung des ökohydrologischen Modells SWIM (Soil and Water Integrated Model) durchgeführt, welches über Schnittstellen mit Klimamodellen und agroökonomischen Modellen verbunden wurde. Ein globales Szenario des Klimawandels und des landwirtschaftlichen Wandels wurde regionalisiert, um so die geänderten Randbedingungen für den Szenarienzeitraum zu erhalten. Simulationen mit SWIM dienten dann dazu, die geänderten Randbedingungen in Änderungen im Wasserhaushalt und in den landwirtschaftlichen Erträgen zu transformieren. Außerdem wurde das Langzeitverhalten von Nährstoffen im Untersuchungsgebiet modelliert. Besonderer Wert wurde dabei darauf gelegt, die Unsicherheit der Szenarienergebnisse zu quantifizieren. Der mittlere Szenarientrend zeigt eine Reduzierung der mittleren jährlichen Niederschläge bis zum Jahre 2055 um ungefähr 1.5 %, wobei die Ergebnisse mit einer großen Unsicherheit behaftet sind: die Spannweite der Niederschläge in den Szenarienrealisationen liegt zwischen -15.3 % und +14.8 %. Die Erwärmung unter Szenarienbedingungen mit ungefähr 1.4 K ist weniger unsicher. Diese relativ geringen Änderungen habe starke Auswirkungen auf den Wasserhaushalt im Elbegebiet: durch die steigenden Temperaturen wird die Vegetationszeit verlängert, und die Niedrigabflussperiode im Sommer wird sich in den Herbst ausdehnen. Insgesamt wird unter dem mittleren Szenarientrend die Wasserverfügbarkeit um ca. 15 % abnehmen. Außerdem werden sich durch die steigenden Temperaturen die Anbaubedingungen für wärmeliebende Ackerfrüchte in der Landwirtschaft verbessern. Die Unsicherheit des Klimatrends ist dort am größten, wo auch die lokalen Änderungen am größten sind. Die Simulationsergebnisse für das Nuthe-Teileinzugsgebiet der Elbe zeigen, das Retentionsprozesse im Untergrund und in den Feucht- und Auengebieten einen starken Einfluss auf die Wasserqualität und die Nitratkonzentration der Oberflächengewässer haben, da sie durch ihre Lage im Einzugsgebiet eine Schnittstelle zwischen dem umliegenden Einzugsgebiet und den Flüssen und Seen bilden. Die relativ hohe Umsetzung von Nitrat im Einzugsgebiet der Nuthe kann dadurch erklärt werden, dass Nitrat eine relativ lange Aufenthaltszeit im Grundwasser (im Mittel 40 Jahre) mit einer hohen Nitratumsetzungsrate hat, und durch die guten Denitrifizierungsbedingungen in den Feucht- und Auengebieten. Dazu kommt noch, dass große Nitratmengen durch die Pflanzen in den Feuchtgebieten aus dem Grundwasser aufgenommen werden. Zusammenfassend kann man sagen, das sich die Ökosysteme und die Gesellschaft im Elbeeinzugsgebiet unter Szenarienbedingungen auf niedrigere Wasserverfügbarkeit einstellen müssen. Die Wasserqualität wird sich grundsätzlich zwar weiter verbessern, aber aufgrund der langen Verweilzeit der Nährstoffe im Grundwasser wird dies insbesondere in den Teileinzugsgebieten, in denen die geochemischen Bedingungen für einen hohen Nährstoffumsatz nicht gegeben sind, noch relativ lange dauern. KW - Hydrologie KW - Modellierung KW - Einzugsgebiet KW - Mathematisches Modell KW - Potsdam-Institut für Klimafolgenforschung KW - integrierte hydrologische Modellierung KW - Klimaänderung KW - Wasserqualität KW - Landnutzungsänderung KW - Ertragsänderung KW - integrated hydrolocal modelling KW - climate change impacts KW - water quality KW - land use change KW - ecohydrology Y1 - 2005 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-6052 ER -