Author(s): A. F. Sazhin; S. A. Mosharov; N. D. Romanova; I. V. Mosharova
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Abstract: Ice and water samples were collected from March 28 to April 3,2009 at 4 stations near the White Sea Biological Station, Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences (Chupa Inlet, Kandalaksha Bay). The measured parameters were: bacterial abundance and biomass (includingseparate evaluation for saprophytes and other physiological groups), algal abundance and biomass, chlorophyll a concentration, in situ primary production (C method), and bacterialproduction (direct method using antibiotics) in various layers of ice and water. Evaluation of the primary and bacterial production in the ice layer and in the water of the White Sea in early spring, (P = 0.44-41.1 mgС/m day; P = 1.52-4.35 mg С m day; P = 0.12-13.52 mg С m day; P = 0.04-0.28 mg С m day, respectively) shows that the amount of organic mattersynthesized by phytoplankton in the water layer is insufficient for heterotrophic bacteria and is totally consumed by heterotrophic organisms in the pelagic communities. However, the situation is opposite within the ice layer. Even at the end of biological winter, with no ice melting and no diatom bloom onset at lower ice surface, organic matter production by the ice algae was 3.5 higher than required by the ice microheterotrophs. Therefore, the evidence has been obtained that the productive period in the White Sea starts within the ice communities long before the obvious onset of the spring season.
Year: 2010