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Late Quaternary Climate, Fire, and Vegetation Dynamics

  • Conference paper
Sediment Records of Biomass Burning and Global Change

Part of the book series: NATO ASI Series ((ASII,volume 51))

Summary

Analysis of the abundance of microscopic charcoal in radiocarbon-dated lake and bog sediment cores from midwestern and northeastern U. S. sites provide climate-driven regional fire histories which can be compared to the regional vegetation changes since deglaciation determined from pollen. Charcoal abundances change at or immediately preceding pollen zone boundaries which delineate plant community change. Vegetation stability in the northern conifer forest, coastal pine barrens, and the midwestern oak-savanna requires high fire incidence and highest charcoal abundances are found while these plant communities dominate the landscape. Low charcoal abundances are found when closed-oak, mesophytic hardwood, floodplain, and northeastern boreal forests are inferred from regional pollen. Stable carbon isotope analysis of the sediment charcoal suggests the proportions of C3 or C4 plants on the landscape during the late-glacial and the Holocene and provides evidence for initiation of C4 prairie vegetation in the midwestern U. S. These results suggest that, as with windborne pollen, a regional microscopic windborne charcoal rain exists. The charcoal results demonstrate that fire disturbance was as important a factor in plant community dynamics in the past as it is today. Regional charcoal analysis can be used to reconstruct paleo-environments and climatic variables, and also to validate climate and vegetation models.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IES-Center for Climatic Research, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1225 West Dayton Street, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Marjorie Green Winkler

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  1. Marjorie Green Winkler
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Botany, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27708, USA

    James S. Clark

  2. Centre des Faibles Radioactivités, CNRS/CEA, Avenue de la Terrasse, 91198, Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France

    Hélène Cachier

  3. Arbeitsgruppe Feuerökologie, Max-Planck-Institut für Chemie, Universität Freiburg, D-79085, Freiburg, Germany

    Johann G. Goldammer

  4. Great Lakes Forestry Center, Canadian Forest Service, P6A 5M7, Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, Canada

    Brian Stocks

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© 1997 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Winkler, M.G. (1997). Late Quaternary Climate, Fire, and Vegetation Dynamics. In: Clark, J.S., Cachier, H., Goldammer, J.G., Stocks, B. (eds) Sediment Records of Biomass Burning and Global Change. NATO ASI Series, vol 51. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-59171-6_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-59171-6_15

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-63881-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-59171-6

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