The McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica, are experiencing rapid landscape scale change including increased glacial melt, the expansion of water tracks, thermokarst formation, an increase in the extent of the soil active layer, lake level rise, and altered stream flow. The impacts of these changes for biological communities are currently unknown. The goal of this study was to conduct surveys and experiments in three Dry Valley soil habitats that are expected to undergo change: water tracks, lake margins, and active layer profiles.
Dataset Results
Populations of Plectus murrayi, a mesophilic nematode, have been increasing in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica over the past three decades. In contrast, most other Antarctic nematode species, including Scottnema lindsayae, have experienced constant population declines over the same time period due to climate change related increases in summer temperatures and wetting occurrences. To determine why P.
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This data package includes shapefiles for selected glacier, stream watershed, and stream channel boundaries in the McMurdo Dry Valleys region of Antarctica. A combination of satellite imagery and digital elevation models were used to delineate watershed and stream channel outlines, while glaciers were outlined by hand. Watershed boundaries provide an estimate of the overall topographic contributing area for each stream in Fryxell Basin, whereas stream channel boundaries provide a topographic area estimate for stream channel, beyond the wetted margin, for each stream.