ABSTRACT

Lake Tahoe and Clear Lake are two very important lakes in California, and each have very different characteristics from which lessons can be learned to aid in understanding and managing complex, multiple-stressed ecosystems. Clear Lake is an ancient, shallow, highly productive lake at an elevation of 395 m in an oak woodland-dominated northern Coast Range mountain watershed with rich habitats for breeding and migrating waterfowl, fish-eating birds, and mammals. The lake has a mean depth of about 7 m. Lake Tahoe lies in the crest of the Sierra Nevada mountains at an elevation of 1898 m and is located in a montane-subalpine watershed dominated by coniferous vegetation and nutrient-poor soils. It is a deep lake with a mean depth of 313 m. Each of these lakes has been studied extensively for a number of years.