Seasonal Response of Major Phytoplankton Groups to Environmental Variables along the Campeche Coast, Southern Gulf of Mexico

Abstract

To describe the seasonal response of the major phytoplankton groups to environmental variables along the Campeche coast, southeastern Gulf of Mexico, seven shallow-water (ca. 1 m) stations were monitored from January 2019 to January 2020. Orthophosphate, ammonium, nitrite, nitrate and silicate were measured. Several tests, including ANOVA, the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test, Tukey TSD, Bartlett’s test and canonical correspondence analysis (CCA), were applied. The physicochemical variables (temperature, salinity and pH) recorded are typical for the central coast of Campeche. Seasonal characteristics are affected by the shallowness of the study area. The variation of inorganic nutrient concentrations is likely to be related to specific polluting activities. While the abundance of phytoplankton presented a minimum value of 4.1 × 104 cells L−1 in March, the maximum value of 8.8 × 106 L−1 cells occurred in May; the general average was 5.3 × 105 cells L−1. Based on CCA, the correlation between major phytoplankton groups and physical–chemical variables was high (r ≈ 0.8), indicating a significant relationship. The CCA graphs separated the samples of diatoms by higher values of pH and silicate and separated the samples of cyanobacteria with high values of temperature (>30 °C) from the samples with dinoflagellates and nanoflagellates. Nanoflagellates were abundant in the samples with high values of ammonium and phosphate.

Variación espaciotemporal del fitoplancton nocivo en playas recreativas de Campeche, sureste del golfo de México

“…Another indicator of the effect of anthropogenic stressors along the coasts in the study area is the high abundance of cyanobacteria, which has been accompanied by low salinities (Gómez-Figueroa et al 2023). When coupled with high temperatures (>20 °C), these conditions may favor the growth of cyanobacteria and be closely related to eutrophication en este estudio (ver Tabla 4).…”

“…Otro indicador del efecto de factores estresantes antropogénicos a lo largo de las costas del área de estudio es la alta abundancia de cianobacterias, la cual se acompaña de bajas salinidades (Gómez-Figueroa et al 2023). Cuando se combinan con altas temperaturas (>20 °C), estas condiciones pueden favorecer el crecimiento de cianobacterias y estar estrechamente relacionadas con procesos de eutrofización (Anderson et al 2002).…”