Cultural eutrophication of West Point Lake — a 10-year study

Urban development, primarily in the Atlanta, Georgia, metropolitan area, caused a significant rise in the volume of treated wastewater discharged into the Chattahoochee River from 1976 to 1985. West Point Lake, 109 km downstream from Atlanta, responded to the increased nutrient loading with an increase in mean annual phytoplankton primary productivity of from 550 mg C m^–2 day^–1 in 1976 to 1580 mg C m^–2 day^–1 in 1985, a move from mesotrophic to eutrophic status. Monthly water quality measurements in the lake headwaters failed to detect the trend of increasing enrichment. Phytoplankton chlorophyll a concentrations did not indicate a trend of increasing algal biomass. Increased productivity was caused by improved photosynthetic efficiency that resulted from a shift in the size distribution of algae comprising the phytoplankton community. Larger centric diatoms with relatively slow turnover rates that were dominant during the early years (1976–1980) of impoundment were replaced by smaller green and blue-green algal taxa with faster turnover rates during later years (1981–1985).