| Summary: | Masteroppgave i marin økologi - Universitetet i Nordland, 2012 The seasonal and intra-annual zooplankton community structure, biodiversity and abundance trends in Kandalaksha Bay, White Sea, were described and related to climate related and biological environmental variability over the period 1964 - 1998. 22 taxa, containing both holoplanktonic and meroplanktonic forms were studied. Seasonal variability of the White Sea zooplankton was characterized by overlapping peaks in abundance and biodiversity from the start of June to the start of October. A shift from predominately negative to positive zooplankton abundance and temperature anomalies, signifying an increase in total abundance and a warming of Kandalaksha Bay was observed from the mid eighties. The two most abundant species, Oithona similis and Pseudocalanus minutus showed opposite trends in relative abundance over the study period; O. similis decreased in relative abundance while P. minutus increased in relative abundance. There was also indication of long-term changes among other species: Calanus glacialis and Sagitta elegans increased, whereas relative abundance of A. longiremis, larval Bivalves, larval Echinoderms and Oncea borealis decreased. Yet, overall biodiversity, expressed by the Shannon index remained relatively stable during the years of study, and showed no clear signs of a long-term trend. All species had significant (p < 0.01) multiple regression models and the regressions analysis yielded high degree of explanatory value for the species S. elegans, C. glacialis and P. minutus.
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