Pollen and diatom record long-term complex relationships between diversity and stability in a lake and nearby vegetation from Tingming Lake in Yunnan, SW China

• Published in: Quaternary international 2021-04, Vol.580, p.87-94
• Main Authors: Song, Bing, Wang, Rong, Wang, Qian, Kong, Lingyang, Hu, Zhujun, Zheng, Wenxiu, Yang, Xiangdong
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Diatom; Diversity; Ecosystem; Environmental change; Pollen; Stability
• ISSN: 1040-6182; 1873-4553
• DOI: 10.1016/j.quaint.2020.10.013

We drilled a core in Tingming Lake (located at the tree line) to conduct pollen and diatom analyses. The pollen record shows that the vegetation ecosystem is very stable and has no obvious regime shift signals, although the vegetable belt has moved gradually upward or downward under the backdrop of climate change. There may be a positive relationship between the vegetation ecosystem stability and the turnover component (βsim). Diatoms, which record the lake ecosystem, show an obvious regime shift signal in 1929 AD, which was possibly was due to environmental changes or decreased nutrient inputs. However, there were fluctuations in species richness and species dissimilarity and there was a slightly increased β diversity (βsor), which was mainly interpreted by the increased turnover component (βsim). It is difficult to determine the relationship between the unstable stability and diversity fluctuations. Therefore, the relationships between diversity and stability in the adjacent vegetation and lake ecosystems are different. It is possible that β diversity partitioning may lead to an improved understanding of ecosystem stability.