Mu et al. (2026) Hydrological Alteration‐Induced Vegetation Dynamics in the Poyang Lake Wetland and Their Impacts on Waterbird Conservation

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Hydrological Processes
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-01-01
• Authors: Shaojie Mu, Yanyan Li, Guishan Yang, Rong Wan, Xibao Xu, Bing Li
• DOI: 10.1002/hyp.70390

Research Groups

Not available in the abstract.

Short Summary

This study quantified the 20-year impacts of the Three Gorges Dam on Poyang Lake's hydrology and vegetation, revealing that early water recession increases autumn net primary productivity but reduces critical winter food resources for waterbirds, threatening biodiversity.

Objective

• To quantify the impacts of the Three Gorges Dam's impoundment on hydrological processes, vegetation growth, net primary productivity (NPP), and phenological characteristics in Poyang Lake, and to investigate the influence of these alterations on waterbird habitat suitability.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Poyang Lake wetland.
• Temporal Scale: 20 years (2000–2019).

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Not explicitly mentioned as process models; a synthetic normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) product was generated.
• Data sources: Landsat and MODIS satellite observations.

Main Results

• 22.13% of the lake area experienced a significant increase in annual emergence duration over 20 years, with autumn showing a particularly prominent increase in 33.37% of the area.
• Annual net primary productivity (NPP) consistently increased by 6.85 gC·m⁻²·yr⁻² (p > 0.05) during 2000–2019.
• Autumn NPP showed the largest increasing trend, affecting 36.65% of the lake's floodplain.
• Early water recession led to an earlier start of the growing season for Carex communities, resulting in a significant increase in autumn NPP (7.41 gC·m⁻²·yr⁻², p < 0.05) and high-quality food resources in October and November.
• However, this shift to an earlier peak of the growing season accelerated vegetation senescence, causing a significant decrease in food quality when foraging requirements peaked in December (−0.15 gC·m⁻²·yr⁻², p < 0.01) and January (−0.11 gC·m⁻²·yr⁻², p < 0.01).
• The combined effects of a prolonged dry season and extensive fishery threaten the stability of the Phragmites community, thereby reducing the effectiveness of biodiversity conservation in nature reserves.

Contributions

• Provides a comprehensive 20-year monitoring picture of spatiotemporal hydrological patterns and NPP evolution in Poyang Lake following the Three Gorges Dam impoundment.
• Quantifies the specific impacts of early-water recession on hydrological patterns, vegetation NPP, and phenological characteristics.
• Investigates the influence of hydrological alteration-induced vegetation dynamics on waterbird habitat suitability, linking environmental changes to biodiversity conservation.
• Offers critical reference data for local authorities to optimize hydrological management and biodiversity conservation strategies in the Poyang Lake wetland.

Funding

Not available in the abstract.

Citation

@article{Mu2026Hydrological,
  author = {Mu, Shaojie and Li, Yanyan and Yang, Guishan and Wan, Rong and Xu, Xibao and Li, Bing},
  title = {Hydrological Alteration‐Induced Vegetation Dynamics in the Poyang Lake Wetland and Their Impacts on Waterbird Conservation},
  journal = {Hydrological Processes},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1002/hyp.70390},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.70390}
}