Ecological succession and resilience of plankton recovering from an acute disturbance in freshwater marshes

The increase in extreme events such as storms is one of the major threats that coastal ecosystems will have to face in the near future. In such a context, both maturation and ecological successions processes remain at the core of ecology to better anticipate the changes to ecosystem biodiversity and functions facing environmental stressors. However, these concepts are mainly approached through closed experimental studies that oversimplify the mechanisms. A survey was carried out on a ‘natural’ and open ecosystem subjected to an acute disturbance, i.e. a marine submersion of freshwater drained marshes, occurring after a storm. Plankton biomass, production and taxonomic/functional phytoplankton diversity were followed weekly at four stations over 2 months. Most of the stations were disrupted by this acute disturbance and displayed gradual growth and development, as described in the classical maturation process. The main differences between stations were attributed to the heterogeneity of the communities before the storm, the intensity of the disturbance and the different human actions performed to recover the freshwater environment. The concept of ‘ecological resilience’ was thus better suited than ‘engineering resilience’ for such open systems facing constant fluctuations in environmental drivers. With regard to ecological succession, the more impacted stations were marked by a significant change in taxonomic beta-diversity, with numerous stochastic processes, due to taxa dispersion. They first exhibited a convergence in functional traits due to the increase in nutrient availability drained from the catchment basin and then an increase in divergence when nutrients became limited. [Display omitted] •A survey had been done on drained marshes submitted to a marine submersion.•Plankton was followed weekly at four stations during 2 months in marshes.•An acute disturbance implies an abrupt loss of plankton.•A 40-days after the storm is not sufficient to obtain a resilience of plankton.•The human actions conducted more quickly to attain freshwater environment recovery.