Are small lakes becoming ice free in the Great Lakes Region?
Vimal Mishra, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN; and K. A. Cherkauer and L. C. Bowling The land cover of the Great Lakes Region is dominated by numerous, small lakes. These play an important role in local and regional climate, due to large differences in albedo, surface roughness and heat capacity, compared to the vegetative surface. Lakes also react directly to climate; therefore, an assessment of their sensitivity to historic climate variability not only provides the magnitude of changes that have occurred in the past, but also gives an indication about how these are likely to change in future. Variability and trends of lake ice phenology (i.e. ice formation, ice break up and ice duration) are important indicators, and are related to both climate and lake physical characteristics. Correlation between lake ice phenology and climate variability exists at both short and long temporal scales. Short term variability is related to atmospheric and oceanic oscillations while long term tr
