Metabolism is one of the most fundamental ecosystem processes, but the drivers of variation in metabolic rates among lakes dominated by benthic primary producers remain poorly constrained. Here, we report the magnitudes and potential drivers of whole‐lake metabolism across 43 Swedish arctic–alpine lakes, based on the free‐water diel oxygen technique with sondes deployed during the open‐water season near the surface and bottom...

Ecological theory predicts that the relative distribution of primary production across habitats influence fish size structure and biomass production. In this study, we assessed individual, population, and community-level consequences for brown trout ( Salmo trutta ) and Arctic char ( Salvelinus alpinus ) of variation in estimated habitat specific (benthic and pelagic) and total whole lake (GPP whole ) gross primary production...

Aim We aimed to measure the dominant spatial patterns in ecosystem properties (such as nutrients and measures of primary production) and the multi‐scaled geographical driver variables of these properties and to quantify how the spatial structure of pattern in all of these variables influences the strength of relationships among them. Location and time period We studied > 8,500 lakes in a 1.8 million km 2 area of Northeast U.S....

Lake morphometry may moderate the effects of water color on fish biomass in boreal lakes, but empirical evidence is scarce because there are a limited number of lakes for which both water color and bathymetry have been measured. We evaluated variations in catch‐per‐unit‐effort (CPUE), an indicator of fish biomass, across orthogonal gradients of light extinction and mean depth in 16 small Swedish lakes (mean depth 1.7–4.8 m, su...

Freshwater ecosystems are strongly influenced by both climate and the surrounding landscape, yet the specific pathways connecting climatic and landscape drivers to the functioning of lake ecosystems are poorly understood. Here, we hypothesize that the links that exist between spatial patterns in climate and landscape properties and the spatial variation in lake carbon (C) cycling at regional scales are at least partly mediated...

Dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations in lakes are changing globally, but little is known about potential ecosystem impacts.We evaluated the relationship between DOC and whole‐lake primary production in arctic and boreal lakes. Both light extinction (inhibits primary production) and nutrient availability (stimulates primary production) are positively and nonlinearly related to DOC concentration. These nonlinearities cr...

We assessed spatial variability in dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations measured in nearly 2000 Swedish lakes. Inter‐lake variance peaked at two different scales, representing within‐region and between‐region variability. The variation between regions was greater than the variation among lakes within regions. We tested relationships between DOC and runoff, drainage ratio, and altitude for spatial heterogeneity using g...

A Bayesian mixing model and stable isotopes of carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen were used to evaluate the extent to which six consumers (three fishes, two zooplankton, and a snail) in a naturally productive lake used terrestrial resources, epilimnetic and metalimnetic phytoplankton, benthic algae, and macrophytes. Resource use varied with consumer habitat use and feeding ability, but allochthony was consistently low (averaging 1...

When it comes to evaluating lakes at regional and global scales, a key need is accurate estimates of the abundance and size‐distribution of lakes, which are usually described with the Pareto distribution. We demonstrate the considerable uncertainty that truncation in the lower tail of the Pareto distribution introduces into lake abundance estimates and the selection of the lake size‐distribution. Truncation in the lower tail e...