Long-term ecological changes in streams of the Himalayan Langtang Valley

The primary goal of the project is to elucidate and explain long-term ecological changes in high Himalaya streams in the Langtang Valley of Nepal, between the 1990´s and today. Biological communities of macrofauna, algae and moss will be sampled and environmental variables will be measured and compared with similar historic data from the early 90’ies. The considerable number of stream sites (14) covering a wide altitudinal range of 2400 m and different catchment types (extension, proportion of glacial cover, vegetation type) will allow us to elucidate how different stream types have been affected by climatic and catchment changes during this 30 yr period. This study will, to our knowledge, be first to document long-term ecological changes in high Himalayan streams.