The phytoplankton community of eutrophic shallow lakes is often domina
ted by filamentous cyanobacteria of the family Oscillatoriaceae. In th
is paper we follow two independent approaches to show that this situat
ion is likely to be one of two alternative stable states of the algal
community. First we analyze patterns of cyanobacterial dominance obser
ved in the field, and show that these patterns imply that the algal co
mmunity is a hysteretic system with two alternative equilibria. Then,
we construct a simple competition model to show that hysteresis should
in fact be expected from differences in physiology between cyanobacte
ria and algae. The basic mechanism is that cyanobacteria are the super
ior competitors under conditions of low light, but also promote such c
onditions, as they can cause a higher turbidity per unit of phosphorus
than other algae. This mechanism of hysteresis offers an explanation
for the resistance of cyanobacteria dominance in shallow lakes to rest
oration efforts by means of nutrient reduction.