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Physiography of
Lakes and Reservoirs

DR MUHAMMAD ARSHAD
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Lake habitat
 Lentic or Lacustrine: Habitats with deep,
non-flowing water.
 Pelagic: the open water of a lake above
sediments that don't receive enough light to
maintain photosynthetic organisms.
 Profundal zone: the benthic habitat below
the pelagic waters.
 Littoral zone: the shallow zone of a lake,
where enough light reaches the bottom to
allow the growth of photosynthetic organisms.
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Morphometry
 The shape and size of lakes and their
watersheds – one of the 1st ways to classify
lakes.
 Bathymetric map: a depth contour map of a
lake bottom – provides important information on
geomorphologic properties.
 First measurement: area
 Second measurement : depth
 Volume = area x depth (mean)
 Low mean depth  high productivity
 Retention time = volume/discharge into lake 3

Retention time
 Vary greatly – several hours to thousands
of years
 Important in determining the residence
time of pollutants in a lake
 How quickly the biota can be washed out?
 General influence of tributaries entering
into lake

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Morphometery
 Another important aspect: irregularity or degree of
convolution of shore
 An index used to quantify is termed as shoreline
development (DL).
 It compares the minimum possible circumference of
the lake to its surface area.
 A value of 1 for shoreline development is a perfect
circle and higher value means, it is highly dissected.
 High DL is generally related to small values of mean
depth and mode of formation, and it is indicative of a
high dgree of watershed influence.
 DL = L/2√πAo 5

Stratification
 Density: A primary factor
 May be the result of difference in
temperature or salinity variations
 Classical understanding is based on
consideration of cold-temperate lakes

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Cold-temperate lakes
 During the early spring in a cold-temperate
lake, water is isothermal – top to bottom.
 An isothermal lake can be mixed completely
by wind, leading to spring mixing.
 As the spring season progresses, surface of
water is warmed by solar energy.
 Surface waters heat the most because the
infrared radiation (heat) is absorbed quickly
with depth.
 Temporary stratification
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Stratification
 Surfaces waters of the lake heat enough and
not mixed the warmer by wind to less dense,
the cooler water below.
 Epilimnion: the top of stratified lake
 Metalimnion or thermocline: the zone of
rapid temperature transition
 Hypolimnion: the bottom of the lake at fairly
constant temperature.
 The stratification stays until a prolonged
period of cool weather occurs – Summer
stratification. 8

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General trends
 The epilimnion is very stable relative to ability of wind
to mix a lake.
 There can be some mixing of the top of the
hypolimnion (entrainment) with extreme winds, but
even hurricane-force winds will not fully mix a well-
stratified lake.
 The stratification will break down only when the
autumn weather can cool the epilimnion to
approximately the same temperature as the
hypolimnion.
 Cool air coupled with continued heat losses from
surface evaporation decrease the temperature of the
surface. 9

General trends
 The cooled surface water is denser than
the water immediately below, so it sinks.
 The wind can mix the lake one the entire
lake is isothermal – Fall mixing begins.
 The lake will continue to cool and mix
until formation of an ice cover on the
surface of the lake.
 Winter stratification – no mixing
 Provide important data on the effects of
global warming on freshwater systems.
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Mixing regimes
 Dimictic

 Monomictic

 Amictic

 Ploymictic

 Meromictic 11

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Factors influencing stratification

 Seasonal temperature regimes

 Salinity differences

 Nutrients addition (biomass or dead

organisms)

 Evaporation

 Anoxia and biogeochemistry 13

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A depth contour plot of lake temperature over the course of a year

in a dimictic cold-temperate lake. The thick black line at the top
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right corner of contour plot indicates ice cover.
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Temperature as a function of depth for Triangle Lake, Oregon, on

October I, 1983, and positions of epilimnion, metalimnion, and
hypolimnion

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Stability of the thermocline in Linsley Pond, Connecticut, before

and after a hurricane on September 21,1938, with wind speeds up
to 100 km h-I

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(A) A simple water sampler made from a weighted bottle and stopper,
(B) a sampler that collects water from depth by displacing water at the
surface, and (C) a Kemmerer sampler. Only samplers (such as type C)
that close at depth are suitable for collecting dissolved gas samples. 17
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Water movement & currents in lakes

 Fetch : The length of lake on which the wind
acts
 Langmuir Circulation: spiral circulation
 Seiche: Rocking of a lake’s entire surface
 Internal seiche: It is created where the surface
of a lake appears still, but the plane that forms
the top of the hypolimnion continues to oscillate
for hours or days after the wind ceases.
 Entrainment: movement of water up to the
epilimnion
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How fetch of an irregularly shaped lake varies with wind direction

(A, B)and relationship berween maximum wave height and fetch
(C) (equation for C from Wetzel, 1983).

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Formation of an internal seiche and entrainment associated with wind. Dashed

arrows show water flow. (A) The lake under calm conditions; (B) the wind
deepens the epilimnion on the right; (C) a strong wind mixes some of the
epilimnion with the hypolimnion; (D) the wind stops and the hypolimnion begins
to oscillate; and (E and F) the amplitude of the seiche diminishes over time.

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