Paul Sokoloff
Canadian Museum of Nature

Graham, Mark, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
McMullin, R. Troy, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Alfonso, Noel, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Bull, Roger, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Dare, Oluwayemisi, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Doubt, Jennifer, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Edwards, Mark, Royal Alberta Museum, Edmonton, Canada
Fox, Caroline, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
Hamilton, Paul, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Hendrycks, Ed, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Kresky, Lisa, Maani Ulujuk Ilinniarvik, Rankin Inlet, Canada
LaRoche, Julie, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
Moore, Rhiannon, Ocean Wise, Vancouver, Canada
Piilonen, Paula, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Sahanatien, Vicki, Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, Iqaluit, Nunavut
Teeter, Lianna, Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Victoria, Canada
Tsang, Man-Yin, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
Van Buren, Peter, Institute of Ocean Sciences, Sidney, Canada
Wong, Michael, International Union for the Conservation of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Saarela, Jeffery, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada

Canada C3 was a 150 day marine journey from Toronto, Ontario to Victoria, British Columbia by way of the Northwest Passage. Based on the icebreaker Polar Prince, this expedition brought together a diverse group of Canadians to explore Canada’s coasts while reflecting on the journey’s core themes of Diversity and Inclusion, Reconciliation, Youth Engagement and the Environment. During the expedition’s scientific program, shipboard researchers collected plants and lichens at stops along the journey to add new knowledge on the floristic diversity of Canada. Specimens will be deposited at the National Herbarium of Canada at the Canadian Museum of Nature. In all 1321 collections were made by 42 collectors. The majority of these (922) were made in the Canadian Arctic, and many were gathered from places where no or few botanical collections have been made previously (e.g., Cape Barrow, Nunavut; Tree River, Nunavut). Notable Arctic collections include the Arctic orangebush lichen (Xanthaptychia aurantiaca), a globally rare (G1) species, and a significant eastward range extension of the spruce muskeg sedge (Carex bigelowii subsp. lugens). All Arctic collections will contribute to the museum’s ongoing Arctic floristic research, and all expedition specimens will serve as a scientific legacy to this epic voyage.

Martha Raynolds
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Walker, Donald A. University of Alaska Fairbanks, USA

The Circumpolar Arctic Vegetation Map (CAVM) is a vector (polygon) map showing the dominant physiognomy of Arctic vegetation. It used a consistent circumpolar legend (15 units), was published in 2003, and has been cited over 700 times. This project created a 1-km resolution raster CAVM, providing greater resolution (1-km pixels vs. the 14-km minimum polygon diameter), while maintaining the same vegetation legend, and matching the format of environmental data from satellite sensors.

The new map is based on unsupervised classifications of seventeen geographic/floristic sub-sections of the Arctic, using AVHRR and MODIS data (band and NDVI) and elevation data. The classification units were modeled to the CAVM types using ancillary data: the original CAVM map, climate data, substrate data, regional vegetation maps and ground studies.

The map was reviewed by experts, including many of the original authors of the CAVM from the U.S., Canada, Greenland (Denmark), Iceland, Norway, and Russia. The map will be available on the Alaska Arctic GeoEcological Atlas hosted by GINA at the University of Alaska Fairbanks http://arcticatlas.geobotany.org/. The greater spatial resolution of the raster format allowed more detailed mapping of water bodies and mountainous areas, portrays coastal-inland gradients, and better reflects the heterogeneity of vegetation type distribution.

Simone Gress Hansen
University of Copenhagen

the study is done in cooperation with:
NORDECO - Nordic Agency for Development and Ecology (Denmark)
Snowchange Cooperative (Finland)

This poster presents the results of my thesis work within community based monitoring (CBM) in the Arctic. I have performed fieldwork alongside the first ever Saami led restoration project in Finland, conducted an assessment of the characteristics of Arctic CBM programmes and analyzed CBM data from a “best-example” case study from Greenland, in order to conclude:

1. What are the general characteristics of Arctic CBM programmes?
2. What are the most distinguishing features of CBM compared to scientific monitoring?
3. Is there a difference in the format and the results between CBM data and scientific data?

This study fits into the congress as it aims to promote interdisciplinary discussions to improve Arctic environmental monitoring and advocate for the use of CBM. The poster fits into the theme “Improving knowledge and public awareness”

Besides answering the above, this study concludes that CBM can provide strengthened reliable environmental monitoring, novel discoveries and information that are directly relevant for managers while also making a significant difference in the communities. However, in order to obtain the full potential of CBM it requires researchers to be able to work with various knowledge systems, adapting new interdisciplinary methods and establishing equity and mutual trust.

Peter Pouplier
Arctic SDI - cooperation between the 8 Arctic National Mapping Agencies

Fredrik Persäter, Senior Advisor, Swedish Mapping, Cadastre and Land Registration Authority
Jani Kylmäaho, Head of Development, Topographic data production, National Land Survey Finland

Important data is being processed into Arctic Council reports and for other purposes, but afterwards this data is often very difficult and costly to find and access to be reused.

By using same reference data sources and international standards for data, services and distribution Arctic stakeholders can improve sharing and reusing of data significantly.

The poster will present readily available Arctic data, tools and services for data sharing provided by the Arctic SDI in support of the work of the Arctic Council and the Arctic Scientific community (Arctic SDI Basemap, services and tools in the Arctic SDI Geoportal) as part of the development of an Arctic spatial data infrastructure.

The Arctic SDI is the cooperation between the National Mapping Agencies of the 8 Arctic Countries.

The Poster stand will be manned and the tools and services of the Arctic SDI Geoportal be demonstrated.

The Poster shall be seen as a complementary to the proposed session proposed by the Arctic SDI and CAFF under the theme KNO7: Improve data management, coordination and access.

Tapio Lindholm
Leading expert
Lindholm, Tapio & Kuhmonen, Anna Finnish environment institute, Helsinki. Finland

The BPAN aim is to promote and support a representative protected area network for conservation of biodiversity and boreal-arctic nature - especially forests and wetlands.
The second phase of the BPAN quantified and described protected areas and high conservation value forests in the Barents Region. The project was an initiative of the Barents Euro-Arctic Council’s Working Group on Environment, Subgroup on Nature Protection. It covered the Barents regions in these countries, with the exception of North Karelia in Finland and the Russian archipelagos of Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land.
Between 2015 and 2017 the project produced updated information on progress towards the Aichi Biodiversity Targets 5 and 11 of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The main focus was on forests, which cover about 60% of the study area. The results can be used in nature protection planning and sustainable management of forest resources in the Barents Region.
The concept of high conservation value forests (HCVFs) was used to identify forests that are particularly valuable for biodiversity.
The project formulated expert conclusions regarding the future development of the protected area network as well as preservation of HCVFs, based on statistical information and analyses carried out between 2015 and 2017

Hanna-Kaisa Lakka
Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)

Scandinavian mountains are climate hot spots where both precipitation and temperatures are increasing. They are home to many Arctic species, which are valuable indicators of climate change. Small water bodies are particularly vulnerable to impacts in water quantity and quality due to changes in climate variables. I explored the habitat quality and presence-absence of large cold-adapted and acid sensitive branchiopod in 24 water bodies in Northern Finland. Long time series for precipitation and rainwater pH were used as explanative variables to estimate the potential disappearance risk of Arctic tadpole shrimp (Lepidurus arcticus) in the northern Scandinavian Mountains. Ninety-nine per cent of rain is too acid for the Arctic tadpole shrimp in Northern Finland. Relatively large amounts of acid water rains directly to small ponds in comparison to larger lakes. Climate change together with acid rain will cause a remarkable extinction risk for Arctic tadpole shrimps in the small and shallow ponds.

Tiina Kolari
University of Eastern Finland

Vegetation responses to reindeer grazing are variable and largely determined by vegetation type. Major part of research has focused on impacts of reindeer grazing on dry heaths and meadows, while mire habitats are less studied.
This study was carried out in a treeless oroarctic study area across the border of Finland and Norway (68°49', 23° 49'). We studied the effects of 1) a 13-year exclusion of reindeer summer grazing and 2) long-term (c. 55 years) difference in grazing between Finland (summer grazing) and Norway (winter grazing) on fen vegetation. One characteristic feature of the studied fens is abundance of Salix lapponum, a willow species subject to summer grazing by reindeer. We hypothesized that after a 13-year period of reindeer exclusion, plant community structure in fenced plots is similar to winter-grazed fens in Norway. In addition, we expected that willows grow taller and produce more fruits inside the fenced plots.Vegetation patterns and the main directions of anticipated change were analyzed with non-metric multivariate ordination (NMDS) using 2002 and 2015 subplot-level species cover data. We tested the effects of grazing on S. lapponum height and cover with linear mixed effects model using data from 2002, 2006 and 2015. The fruiting of S. lapponum in response to grazing pressure was studied in 2015.
In ordinations, grazing treatments were widely overlapping, and no uniform direction of change in vegetation was found. Fenced and summer grazed subplots together differed from winter grazed and, thus, legacy of summer grazing on mire plant communities was still apparent over a decade after reindeer exclusion. There was some distinction between winter-grazed subplots and all subplots in Finland, as winter-grazed subplots had less variation in NMDS. High abundance of Salix lapponum, Potentilla palustris and hepatics characterized winter-grazed subplots, while dwarf-shrubs were more common in the Finnish side of the border. We found significant differences in height and cover of S. lapponum between grazing treatments and years. Willows in Norway and in fenced plots were significantly more abundant, grew taller, and female plants had heavier and more frequent fruit bodies than in summer-grazed subplots.
In oroarctic mires, reindeer summer grazing affects S. lapponum stands. Northern mires are large carbon storages, and reindeer grazing may alter carbon cycling in mires via affecting on shrub abundance. The longer-term role of mammal herbivory in arctic mires is, however, still uncertain and the issue should be considered in Arctic research.

Anastasia Taskaeva
Institute of biology Komi SC UB RAS

Alla Kolesnikova - Institute of biology Komi SC UB RAS
Tatyana Konakova - Institute of biology Komi SC UB RAS
Maria Baturina - Institute of biology Komi SC UB RAS

An important problem of modern ecology is the distribution of invasive species. The main attention is focused on the colonization of soil ecosystems by foreign species of earthworms and beetles, at less – collembola. We hypothesize that the establishment of these species near hydrogen sulphid habitats results from increased frequency of introductions and warm, thermal stability in organic riched soils during the nordic winter. The study of terrestrial ecosystems near hydrogen sulfide springs was not carried out, while rare carbonate soils develop in these places (Deneva et al., 2015). Our researches were carried out on the Vodny spring - a tributary of the Vorkuta river (координаты) in the framework of the project № 18-4-4-37 “Biodiversity of invertebrates in extreme climatic conditions of the subarctic regions (Ural and adjacent areas)”. We revealed some species of Collembola, Lumbricidae and Coleoptera, among them three invasive species Folsomia fimetaria, Desoria trispinata, also Eiseniella tetraedra, which are recorded for the first time on the north-east of the european tundra.

Natalya Sokolova

Arctic Research Station of Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology, Ural Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, 629400, Zelenaya Gorka Str., 21, Labytnangi, Russia.

Aleksandr A. Sokolov, Arctic Research Station of Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology, Ural Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Labytnangi, Arctic Research Center of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District, Salekhard, Russia Russia; Dorothee Ehrich, University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway, Department of Arctic and Marine Biology, Tromsø, Norway; Ivan А. Fufachev, Arctic Research Station of Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology, Ural Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Labytnangi, Russia; Briggite Sabard, Universite´ de Bourgogne, Dijon, Groupe de Recherche en Ecologie Arctique, Francheville, France, Olivier Gilg, Universite´ de Bourgogne, Dijon, Groupe de Recherche en Ecologie Arctique, Francheville, France

Shorebirds are the most common birds in the north of the Yamal Peninsula. In 2016-2017, we measured the impact of predators on 3 Calidris species (Calidris alpine, Calidris minuta, Calidris temminckii) in Sabetta, which is located between low and high arctic (71°N). We implemented three methods: 1. a standardized measure of predation pressure was monitored using artificial nests (50% uncovered and 50% covered with moss/lichens); 2. daily survival rates of Calidris nests was assessed by monitoring the incubation temperature in the nest cups; 3. monitoring of the breeding activity of arctic foxes and predator birds. During our study, the abundance of small rodents (Dicrostonyx torquatus, Lemmus sibiricus, Microtus voles) was less than 1 per 100 trap-nights. The number of active dens varied from 1.5 to 9.6 per 100 km2, and the number of nests of predator birds was 0.8 and 2.2 per 100 km2 (2016 and 2017 respectively). Predation rates on artificial and real nests varied with breeding activity of arctic foxes and predator birds. In 2017 the high predation rate on “covered” (artificial) nests suggests that Arctic fox was the main predator of nests. This study is part of a long-term and large-scale initiative by the “Interactions Working Group”.

Saija Kuusela
Finnish Environment Institute

Aapala, Kaisu, Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland
Aalto, Juha, Finnish Meteorological Institute, Helsinki, Finland
Heikkinen, Risto, Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland
Leikola, Niko, Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland
Pöyry, Juha, Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland
Virkkala, Raimo, Finnish Environment Institute, Helsinki, Finland

Climate change is projected to cause negative impacts on species, ecosystems and the services they provide. Traditional static nature conservation should be complemented with climate-wise conservation planning, so that the dynamic changes in species distributions and assemblages will be properly taken into account. The SUMI project (2017–2019) will provide an in-depth assessment of the effectiveness and adaptive capacity of Finnish protected area (PA) network in protecting biodiversity and supporting key ecosystem services under the growing pressures of climate change and land use. The project addresses several Arctic Biodiversity Assessment recommendations, especially 13 and 16, and focuses on four work packages: the vulnerability of species to climate change (i.e. species exposure, adaptive capacity and sensitivity to climate change, WP1), the effects of climate change on habitat types and ecosystems (especially boreal forests, peatlands and alpine biotopes, WP2), the role of biogeophysical characteristics of PAs in mitigating the impacts of climate change (fine-scale velocity of the climate change, local climatic variability and refugia, WP3) and the role of PAs in carbon sequestration and storage (WP4). This poster presents the scope and aims of the project, and selected key methods employed in assessing the representativeness of Finnish PA network under climate change.

Jeffery Saarela
Canadian Museum of Nature

Gualtieri, Lisa C.
Robillard, Cassandra M.
Sharp, Lyndsey A.
Sokoloff, Paul C.
Saarela, Jeffery M.*
All authors have the same affiliation: Centre for Arctic Knowledge and Exploration, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada.
*Presenting author

Core to the polar research information spectrum are the millions of biological and geological specimens in natural history collections. These specimens represent biodiversity data documenting the distribution of species in time and space; they serve as vouchers for the datasets that underpin scientific conclusions, allowing future workers to confirm or revise identifications; and they are sources of new data, such as genetic information. Most natural history museums face the massive “big data” challenge of databasing and imaging their collections, allowing them to be widely discovered, shared, used and reused in research and outreach. The Canadian Museum of Nature houses over 300K Arctic specimens – the largest Arctic natural history collection in Canada – but data for only a subset are currently accessible online. To correct this, the National Herbarium of Canada is engaged in a project to digitize, georeference and image its Arctic plant, moss and lichen specimens, according to global standards that facilitate collection data sharing and integration. The work is focused on collections made in the three Canadian territories: Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut. This work fits into the Congress theme "Improving data management, coordination and access".

Paul Sokoloff
Canadian Museum of Nature

Srivastava, Anushree, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
McMullin, R. Troy, Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa, Canada
Murakami, Yusuke, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Stepanova, Anastasiya, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Clarke, Jonathan, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Knightly, Paul, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Mangeot, Alexandre, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
LaRoche, Claude-Michel, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Beattie, Annalea, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Zubrin, Robert, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America
Rupert, Shannon, Mars Society, Lakewood, United States of America

The Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station (FMARS) at Haughton Crater, Devon Island, Nunavut, and its counterpart, the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) in southern Utah, are simulated Mars outposts situated at two well-known Martian planetary analogs - environments that are geologically and environmental similar to the solar system’s fourth planet. Owned and operated by the Mars Society, these stations host researchers learning how to live and work on Mars. Crews conduct research programs on everything from testing new rovers to isolating local microbes; these Astrobiology simulations are a particularly important dress-rehearsal in the search for potential life on Mars. These studies rely on comprehensive knowledge of the local biota, therefore traditional natural history surveys are an important component of these mock missions. As a part of the Mars 160 Twin Study program conducted by the Mars Society in 2016-2017 our team conducted a lichen biodiversity survey of these two stations during two simulated Martian missions, resulting in 146 new lichen collections deposited at the National Herbarium of Canada (CANL) at the Canadian Museum of Nature. We will highlight the results of this first taxonomic lichen survey of Haughton Crater, an important field site in the Canadian High Arctic.

Debbie Jenkins
Environmental and Life Sciences Graduate Program, Trent University

Lecomte, Nicolas, Canada Research Chair in Polar and Boreal Ecology and Centre d’Études Nordiques, Department of Biology, University of Moncton, Moncton, New-Brunswick, E1A 3E9, Canada
Schaefer, James, A., Department of Biology, Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario, K9L 0G2, Canada
Olsen, Steffen M. Danish Meteorological Institute, Lyngbyvej 100, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark
Swingedouw, Didier, UMR CNRS 5805 EPOC-OASU-Université de Bordeaux, Allée Georoy St-Hilaire 33615 Pessac, France
Côté, Steeve D., Département de Biologie and Centre d’Études Nordiques, Université Laval, Québec, Québec, G1V 0A6, Canada
Pellissier, Loïc, Landscape Ecology, Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystems, ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland &
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Birmensdorf, Switzerland
Yannic, Glenn, LECA - Laboratoire d’Écologie Alpine – UMR CNRS 5553, Université Savoie Mont Blanc –73376 Le Bourget-du-Lac, France

Global warming threatens to reduce connectivity through significant and rapid changes to sea ice. Here we examine how past changes in sea-ice extent modulated population connectivity and forecast the long-term viability of island caribou under accelerated warming scenarios in the most complex archipelago of the Arctic. Using genetic fingerprinting and future sea-ice projections, we contrast genetic mixing in island-dwelling Peary caribou to continental-migratory caribou and explore the impact of spatial and temporal changes in sea ice extent. We found a strong correlation between genetic and geodesic distances for both Peary and continental caribou (Mantel’r=0.61, P

Petteri Vihervaara
Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE)

Mononen, Laura, Finnish Environment Insitute (SYKE), Joensuu, Finland;
Kopperoinen, Leena, Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE), Helsinki, Finland;
Viinikka, Arto, Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE), Helsinki, Finland;
Auvinen, Ari-Pekka, Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE), Oulu, Finland;
Jäppinen, Jukka-Pekka, Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE), Helsinki, Finland;
Niikkonen, Kristiina, Ministry of the Environment, Helsinki, Finland.

Mapping and assessment of ecosystems and their services (MAES) has been a key initiative of the EU Biodiversity Strategy, Action 5 in particular. The EU Biodiversity Strategy sets the requirement for an EU-wide knowledge base designed to be: a primary data source for developing Europe’s green infrastructure; resource to identify areas for ecosystem restoration; and, a baseline against which the goal of ‘no net loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services’ can be evaluated. Finland has contributed in EU wide cooperation to design harmonized, flexible methodology for quantification, mapping and modeling of ecosystem extent, condition and the ecosystem services. Assessment methods include biophysical, social and economic methods. In this poster, we will show how Finland has contributed to MAES, and what are the future needs and options.

MAES work is closely related to development of Arctic Biodiversity Assessment, and it bridges the importance of biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, and human well-being. MAES for Finland covers the biomes of boreal forests and arctic tundra. In addition climate change is expected to influence also ecosystem services, and to monitor these changes we need better spatial information of the current status of ecosystems.

Linda Shaw
U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service
Shaw, Linda, National Marine Fisheries Service, Juneau, Alaska, U.S.A.
McCann, Linda, Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, Tiburon, California, U.S.A.
Bors, Eleanor, Ph.D., National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Office of International Affairs, Washington D.C., U.S.A.
Bush-St. Louis, Kendra, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Homer, Alaska, U.S.A.
Harding, Ann M.A., Ph.D., Auk Ecological Consulting, Cordova, Alaska, U.S.A.
Lestenkof, Pamela, Aleut Community of St. Paul, St. Paul, Alaska, U.S.A.
Divine, Lauren, Ph.D., Aleut Community of St. Paul, St. Paul, Alaska, U.S.A.
Padula, Veronica, Aleut Community of St. Paul, St. Paul, Alaska, U.S.A.

The poster describes how a marine invasive species monitoring station was established with the Alaska Native community of St. Paul on St. Paul Island in conjunction with marine invasive species lessons during a K-12 educational event, Bering Sea Days. Lessons included an invading invasive species tag game, invertebrate species collection and identification from the harbor where monitoring is occurring, ballast water forensics game and Arctic Council ballast water negotiation simulation. Results of monitoring will be shared with databases connected to data mobilization delivery platforms.
The poster supports the following Arctic Biodiversity Assessment recommendations and implementation actions.
AS1: Invasive species in the Arctic: prevention, detection, and response
KNO1: Circumpolar Marine Biodiversity Monitoring

Marina Venger
Murmansk marine biological institute
Marina Venger, Murmansk marine biological institute
Pavel Makarevich, Murmansk marine biological institute

A significant part of carbon fluxes in marine Arctic ecosystems passes through microbial food web, in which virio- and bacterioplankton plays an important role. Communities were investigated in the Barents Sea northeast drifting ice zone for the first time (April 2016, RV "Dalnie Zelentsy"). Temperature and salinity (STD-probe), oxygen concentration (Winkler method), chlorophyll (spectrophotometry), viruses and bacteria number (epifluorescence microscopy) were measured in the water column.
Temperature (from 2.13 to -1.84°C) and salinity of the photic layer upper part (34.45-34.89psu), oxygen saturation (

Evgenia Panoriou
Hellenic Ornithological Society / BirdLife Greece
Vougioukalou, Manolia, Hellenic Ornithological Society/BirdLife Greece, Athens, Greece

The critically endangered Fennoscandian population of the Lesser White-fronted Goose – LWfG spends ca. 6 months in Greece during winter. In order to foster responsible citizenship behaviour for the environment and to contribute to the international conservation efforts for the LWfG, a comprehensive Environmental Education Programme –EEP was created and implemented by schools.

The LWfG was used as a tool and symbol to pedagogically approach the value of biodiversity by also highlighting the global perspective of losing a threatened species. The main actions towards the achievement of that were the creation of educational material for three age groups, material evaluation and teacher training; and field trips in LWfG habitats. The structure, the variety of the material and the engagement of the local educational community resulted in the engagement of ca. 6,000 pupils and the production of various school projects that underlined the LWfG threats during migration, such as illegal killing and habitat loss.

The EEP contributes directly to the implementation of the Arctic Migratory Bird Initiative (AMBI), in which the LWfG is prioritized as a flagship species, can also be replicated for other AMBI species and is relevant to Key Finding 3 and Policy Recommendation 8 of the Arctic Biodiversity Assessment.

Eva Myskova
Centre for Polar Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice
Ditrich Oleg, Centre for Polar Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice,České Budějovice, Czech Republic 

Intestinal parasites are not usually perceived as the most evil creatures on the planet although exceptions exist. Certainly, they do not make our lives easier if contracted as an infection nor they help with efforts in the wildlife conservation programs and especially when it comes to parasites transmitted between human and the wildlife. Arctic fox (Vulpes lagopus), one of the major predators in the Arctic, is a potential source of intestinal parasites that could endanger people and dogs alike. Most common inhabitants of its intestinal tract are Toxascaris leonina, Trichuris vulpis and Eucoleus aerophilus and all three of them have a zoonotic potential. In addition, the list of parasites inhabiting foxes entrails that could be harmful not only to them is still incomplete. Furthermore, the matter is aggravated by dogs living in close proximity to humans that can cause a spread of diseases and increase the chance of transmission.

Veronika Vodopyanova
Murmansk marine biological institute
Pavel Vashchenko Murmansk marine biological institute
Pavel Makarevich Murmansk marine biological institute

In the north-east of the Barents Sea shelf in the spring 2016, the composition of phytoplankton and its photosynthetic pigments distribution were studied. Seawater samples were taken at 14 stations (south of the Franz Josef Land archipelago) in the fields of young and annual ice on standard hydrological horizons. The phytoplankton composition was determined in Najott's chamber at × 100-400.
The chlorophyll а concentration was measured spectrophotometrically, the temperature and salinity by SEACAT SBE 19 plus. Satellites data on the chlorophyll concentration also were used.
CTD data showed that research was carried out in the Atlantic and Arctic waters. The composition of phytoplankton (diatoms dominated), its biomass and low chlorophyll content in April (≤1 mg/m3) indicated the absence of active vegetation of microphytoplankton, chlorophyll concentrations decreased with moving away from the ice edge. Algal blooming with the dominance of diatoms (Talassiosira hyalina, Chaetoceros socialis) and golden algae (Phaeocystis pouchetii), as well as maximum concentrations of chlorophyll (5.56 mg/m3) was recorded in mid-May. Comparison of field data (chlorophyll) with remote sensing revealed lower values in sub-satellite measurements.
The results of research can be applied for possible changes analysis in the structural and functional organization of Arctic algal communities under changing climate.

Willem Goedkoop
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences

Arctic lakes in Fenno-Scandia are experiencing rapid environmental changes resulted from climate change and other human-induced activities. Despite this knowledge of the trends in overall biodiversity and their environmental drivers in Arctic Fenno-Scandian lakes is lacking. In particular, ecosystem-scale (i.e. whole-lake) baselines of biodiversity that integrate habitats (pelagic and benthic) and trophic levels (primary producers to predators) are yet to be established. To address these knowledge gaps, we analyzed data of abiotic variables and biodiversity (i.e. fish, benthic macroinvertebrates, zooplankton, phytoplankton, benthic diatoms and macrophytes) collected from 74Arctic and subarctic lakes in Faroe Islands, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Both univariate and multivariate analyses have been employed for spatiotemporal comparisons and to address the contemporary monitoring status of Arctic Fenno-Scandian lakes. Our findings identify the biotic components that are sensitive to abiotic changes, provide the basis for regional impact assessments of anthropogenic stressors, and contribute to establishing abiotic and biotic baselines for the biodiversity of these lakes.