Picocyanobacteria distribution in the Ebro estuary (Spain)

Abstract

The stratified estuary of the Ebro River is located on the Mediterranean coast of Spain. From samples obtained in 6 sampling campaigns between July 1999 and February 2000 from the last 18 km of Ebro River, the abundance of picocyanobacteria was estimated by epifluorescence microscopy. The abundance of picocyanobacteria reached 93.7 x106 cells/L in the river mouth (station R1) below the surface, in October 1999. In deeper layers of salt wedge area stations (near the river mouth), we could observe higher concentrations of marine cyanobacteria. This study offers comments about the abundance and distribution in cyanobacteria.

This research was financially supported by European community MAS3-CT98-0170 (DG12-VOMA):PIONEER»PreparationandIntegration of analysis tools towards Operational forecast of Nutrients in Estuaries of European Rivers«. We thank to J.G. del Río and J. P. Sierra like project managers, to M. Rodilla, I. Romero, S. Falco and R. Martínez for field assistance and laboratory analyses, and M. Fullana for her assistance with bibliographic search.

Peer Reviewed

Postprint (published version)