Mercury and water level fluctuations in lakes of northern Minnesota - Summary of Sampling Sites Inundated Area Estimates

Water level fluctuations substantially alter the fauna, flora and microbial community of near-shore aquatic ecosystems. Water level management therefore has the potential to strongly influence a wide variety of ecosystem processes. Many northern temperate lake food webs experience substantial methylmercury contamination, which is partially mediated by the action of sulfate reducing bacteria occurring in sediments that are periodically inundated. For lakes with methylmercury problems, water level management could be designed to reduce methylmercury contamination. These data summarize inundated areas at varying water surface elevations for several northern Minnesota lakes, as part of the project described above. The inundated areas were estimated for water surface elevations in 0.1 meter increments between a range of seasonal minimum and maximum water surface elevation values.