The last 50 years of climate-induced melting of the Maliy Aktru glacier (Altai Mountains, Russia) revealed in a primary ecological succession

In this article, we report and discuss the results obtained from a survey of plants,microorganisms (bacteria and fungi), and soil elements along a chronosequence in thefirst 600 m of the Maliy Aktru glacier's forefront (Altai Mountains, Russia). Manyglaciers of the world show effects of climate change. Nonetheless, except for somelocal reports, the ecological effects of deglaciation have been poorly studied andhave not been quantitatively assessed in the Altai Mountains. Here, we studied theecological changes of plants, fungi, bacteria, and soil elements that take the form ofa primary ecological succession and that took place over the deglaciated soil of theMaliy Aktru glacier during the last 50 year. According to our measurements, the glacierlost about 12 m per year during the last 50 years. Plant succession shows clearsigns of changes along the incremental distance from the glacier forefront. The analysisof the plant ?-and?-diversityconfirmed an expected increase of them with increasingdistance from the glacier forefront. Moreover, the analysis of ?-diversityconfirmed the hypothesis of the presence of three main stages of the plant succession:(a) initial (pioneer species) from 30 to 100 m; (b) intermediate (r-selectedspecies)from 110 to 120-150 m; and (c) final (K-selectedspecies) from 150 to 550. Ourstudy also shows that saprotrophic communities of fungi are widely distributed in theglacier retreating area with higher relative abundances of saprotroph ascomycetes atearly successional stages. The evolution of a primary succession is also evident forbacteria, soil elements, and CO2 emission and respiration. The development of biologicalcommunities and the variation in geochemical parameters represent an irrefutableproof that climate change is altering soils that have been long covered by ice.