NWT RESEARCH DATABASE

Regions: Inuvialuit Settlement Region, Gwich'in Settlement Area

Tags: physical sciences, water quality, slumping, benthic invertebrates, fish population, permafrost thaw, ecosystem

Objective(s): To investigate impacts of permafrost slumping on water quality, benthic macroinvertebrate communities, fish communities and ecosystem function.

Project Description: This licence has been issued for the scientific research application No.4985. The objectives of this project are to investigate impacts of permafrost slumping on water quality, benthic macroinvertebrate communities, fish communities and ecosystem function by (a) advancing research on previously studied thaw slumps within the Stony Creek Watershed and include unstudied (for biotic metrics) thaw slumps in the Willow River Watershed, an area showing increasing thaw-slump activity. The research team will directly collaborate with the Northwest Territories Geological Survey’s NWT Permafrost Mapping Collective to make use of their extensive database of physico-chemical parameter information from long-term monitoring of thaw-slumps in the Peel Plateau. These explanatory variables will be used to explore the cumulative effects of ongoing permafrost disturbance on aquatic ecosystem health (i.e., biotic community structure, foodweb dynamics, and ecological functioning) and associations between physical (i.e., geomorphological) and instream biological condition. Through this collaboration they will develop predictive tools such as ecological effects thresholds and monitoring tools such as sensitive bioindicators that can be used to detect impacts of permafrost disturbance and aid in community-driven climate-change adaptation strategies and be used for management boards for permitting activities. The research team will directly involve community stakeholders from local Renewable Resource Councils in data collection and dissemination. Provide information to local communities on the impacts of mega-slumps on aquatic ecosystem health, including food web impacts, if any. Provide training opportunities and educational workshops for individuals interested in environmental monitoring from within the communities. A total of 25 candidate streams will be considered, including 10 undisturbed (i.e., no retrogressive thaw slumps), 5 minimally disturbed (i.e., 1-2 slumps <5 ha), and 10 highly disturbed sites (i.e., numerous large thaw slumps). Study sites will be considered based upon past sampling activity. The research team plan to use a scientifically robust approach (several approaches to be considered such as the Reference Condition Approach) to compare reference study sites to permafrost disturbance sites. CABIN (Canadian Aquatic Biomonitoring Network) monitoring techniques will be used to sample macroinvertebrates and water quality. This method uses a Kick-net (metal wire D-frame, mesh size = 400 um) placed downstream of the collector and against stream substrate. The collector disturbs the substrate for a total of 3 minutes. 3-5 replicate Kick-nets will be collected at each stream. Samples are removed from the net and preserved in 95% ethanol for transport. The team will use complementary approaches to better understand permafrost disturbance and threats to the provision of ecosystem services. Water samples will be collected and processed at the Taiga Environmental Laboratory in Yellowknife. Habitat characteristics will be documented using CABIN techniques. Stable Isotope Analyses (SIA) will be used to investigate foodwebs in streams impacted by permafrost disturbance. The research team will consider the isotopic signatures (d13C and d15N) for (potentially) fish and macroinverterbates. Multivariate analyses (e.g., Redundancy analysis) and modeling procedures (e.g., Akaike Information Criterion) will be used to investigate associations between physical parameters (data from NWT Mapping Collective, NWT Geological Survey) and the biological data produced from this study. All publications and presentations that result from this research will acknowledge NWT Cumulative Impacts Monitoring Program (CIMP) and, with permission, the community members and organizations involved in the project. Plain language presentations and summaries will be provided to Renewable Resource Council’s (RRCs) and Hunters and Trappers Committee (in Aklavik) located in the study region, and nearby. RRCs (and HTC) involved in this project will be given access to all biological data collected during this research. The research team will be building on past successful CIMP projects that resulted in scientific publications, presentations, development of monitoring guidelines, and novel datasets related to permafrost impacts on aquatic environments (i.e., mapping permafrost disturbance and impacts to aquatic systems across northern NWT). The team will be teaming up with other Wilfrid Laurier University researchers associated with Northern Water Futures to expand on objectives of existing research. The fieldwork for this study will be conducted from July 6, 2021 to August 21, 2021.