A Climatic Driver for Abrupt Mid-Holocene Vegetation Dynamics and the Hemlock Decline in New England

Foster, David R.; Oswald, W. Wyatt; Faison, Edward K.; Doughty, Elaine D.; Hansen, Brad

doi:10.1890/0012-9658(2006)87[2959:acdfam]2.0.co;2

Cited by 116 publications

(117 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Finally, paleoecological evidence supports the contention that similar past abrupt climatic changes may have caused analogous drought-induced diebacks of tree species thus leading to rapid (ca. 500 years) changes in forest composition (Foster et al 2006). Moving-interval correlations functions show the significant (P < 0.05) bootstrap correlation coefficients based on the relationships between monthly climatic data (T mean temperature; P total precipitation) and the mean chronologies for declining (a) and non-declining (b) sites.…”

Section: Climate-growth Associations: the Critical Rolementioning

confidence: 99%

The Multiple Factors Explaining Decline in Mountain Forests: Historical Logging and Warming-Related Drought Stress is Causing Silver-Fir Dieback in the Aragón Pyrenees

Camarero

2017

High Mountain Conservation in a Changing World

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The drivers and patterns of drought-related forest dieback are not as well understood in mountain conifer forests. Most studies have obviated the role of historical use as a predisposing factor of forest dieback. Here I focus on the recent silver-fir (Abies alba) dieback observed since the 1980s in the Aragón Pyrenees (NE Spain) as study case. I argue that such dieback was predisposed by past historical logging and incited by warming-induced drought. I analyzed environmental, structural and tree-ring data from 32 sites with contrasting degrees of dieback at the tree and stand levels. I found that a peak in late-summer water deficit observed in 1985 caused a severe growth reduction in 1986, resulting in subsequent crown defoliation, dieback and increased mortality. Dieback was more severe and widespread in western low-elevation mixed forests dominated by smaller trees with low growth rates. These marginal sites receive less late-summer rainfall, which is a key climatic variable controlling silver-fir growth, than eastern sites. Declining sites showed more frequent growth releases induced by historical logging than non-declining sites. Silver-fir growth is becoming more dependent on climatic conditions of previous September, which may be connected with changing modes of atmospheric variability affecting Iberian climate. Historical logging and warming-induced drought stress during late summer are the most likely predisposing and inciting factors driving silver-fir dieback, respectively. A sustainable management of mountain forests shaped by past historical use requires changing their current structure and composition to make them more resilient to climate warming.

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Section: Climate-growth Associations: the Critical Rolementioning

confidence: 99%

The Multiple Factors Explaining Decline in Mountain Forests: Historical Logging and Warming-Related Drought Stress is Causing Silver-Fir Dieback in the Aragón Pyrenees

Camarero

2017

High Mountain Conservation in a Changing World

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“…Lake level records indicate drawdown, rapid at some sites, approximately coincident with the Tsuga decline at sites in New England and the central Great Lakes (Yu et al 1997, Haas and McAndrews 2000, 2009b. Coastal areas of southern New England show a nearly concurrent rapid decline in Quercus, suggesting a common mechanism (Foster et al 2006). Although a role for pests or pathogens has not been ruled out, several recent papers argue that the Tsuga decline resulted from abrupt climate change (Shuman et al 2009b, Zhao et al 2010b, Oswald and Foster 2011.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, the final Tsuga decline at some sites was preceded by transient declines in Tsuga pollen, followed by rebound to high percentages (e.g., Fuller 1998, Haas and McAndrews 2000, Foster et al 2006, Oswald and Foster 2011. These fluctuations, absent in most lowdensity pollen sequences, might represent local disturbances, but may also indicate dynamic responses to climate variability or pathogen outbreaks preceding the final decline.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Finally, currently available independent paleoclimate records are mostly from different sites or cores than those with pollen records of the Tsuga decline (Haas and McAndrews 2000, Foster et al 2006, Shuman et al 2009b. Although significant climate changes occurred between 6000 and 5000 yr BP, causal attribution is uncertain in the absence of clear demonstration that the Tsuga decline was coincident with, or immediately preceded by, a rapid climate transition.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Decomposing the mid‐Holocene Tsuga decline in eastern North America

Booth

Brewer

Blaauw

et al. 2012

Ecology

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Abstract. The mid-Holocene decline of Tsuga canadensis (hereafter Tsuga) populations across eastern North America is widely perceived as a synchronous event, driven by pests/ pathogens, rapid climate change, or both. Pattern identification and causal attribution are hampered by low stratigraphic density of pollen-sampling and radiometric dates at most sites, and by absence of highly resolved, paired pollen and paleoclimate records from single sediment cores, where chronological order of climatic and vegetational changes can be assessed. We present an intensely sampled (contiguous 1-cm intervals) record of pollen and water table depth (inferred from testate amoebae) from a single core spanning the Tsuga decline at Irwin Smith Bog in Lower Michigan, with high-precision chronology. We also present an intensively sampled pollen record from Tower Lake in Upper Michigan. Both sites show high-magnitude fluctuations in Tsuga pollen percentages during the pre-decline maximum. The terminal decline is dated at both sites ca. 5000 cal yr BP, some 400 years later than estimates from other sites and data compilations. The terminal Tsuga decline was evidently heterochronous across its range. A transient decline ca. 5350 cal yr BP at both sites may correspond to the terminal decline at other sites in eastern North America. At Irwin Smith Bog, the terminal Tsuga decline preceded an abrupt and persistent decline in water table depths by ;200 years, suggesting the decline was not directly driven by abrupt climate change. The Tsuga decline may best be viewed as comprising at least three phases: a long-duration predecline maximum with high-magnitude and high-frequency fluctuations, followed by a terminal decline at individual sites, followed in turn by two millennia of persistently low Tsuga populations. These phases may not be causally linked, and may represent dynamics taking place at multiple temporal and spatial scales. Further progress toward understanding the phenomenon requires an expanded network of high-resolution pollen and paleoclimate chronologies.

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“…In addition, a raised lake level Pathway 2: large-scale fire event Pb and Hg concentrations were generally both low throughout Unit 2, but isolated high Hg and Pb values occurred at ∼5000 cal BP. During this time an abrupt hydroclimatic transition took place (Jetté and Mott 1995;Forster et al 2006;Booth et al 2012) as regional climate became much drier and there was likely an increased incidence of forest fires (Railton 1975;Ali et al 2009). Forest fires commonly result in the significant mobilization of cations concentrated in forest biomass, which are then transported to lakes by surface and groundwater runoff (Young and Jan 1977;Caldwell et al 2000).…”

Section: Metal Pathways Through Timementioning

confidence: 99%

A paleolimnological archive of metal sequestration and release in the Cumberland Basin Marshes, Atlantic Canada

Dunnington

White

Spooner

et al. 2017

FACETS

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We used a paleolimnological approach at Long Lake, Nova Scotia, to construct a 10 500-year record of metal deposition in lakebed sediments and elucidate the influence of both natural and anthropogenic environmental changes. Aquatic sediment concentrations of mercury (Hg), arsenic (As), and chromium (Cr) in Long Lake fluctuated substantially and, during some periods, exceeded guidelines for the protection of aquatic life. Increases in lead (Pb), Hg, Cr, trace metals, and nitrogen stable isotopes (δ 15 N) were broadly coincident with a period of widespread drying from ca. 8000 to 4000 cal BP and were likely a consequence of regional fires. From ca. 4000 cal BP until 1700 AD, metal levels in general were low due to decreased erosion, increased precipitation, and reduced fire activity. Water level lowering and forced sediment aggradation (tiding) in the 1800s led to increases in minerogenic Pb and Cr, though fossil fuel combustion also likely contributed to total Pb concentrations. Stratigraphic proxies indicated increased inorganic sedimentation rates, and reduced autochthonous productivity were coincident with lower Hg and As concentrations in the Long Lake sediment. Our data indicate that natural phenomena (fire) can result in sediment contaminant exceedances, that most metals have multiple sources, and that both human-induced disturbance and emissions have contributed to Pb contamination in the last 200 years. In addition, wetter and generally cooler climate appeared to favour lower concentrations of contaminants in lake sediments. Although wetland sediments in the Cumberland Basin Marshes are not heavily polluted with metals, the development of constructed wetlands and the disruption of aquatic sediments have the potential to concentrate, mobilize, and increase the bioavailability of metals.

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A Climatic Driver for Abrupt Mid-Holocene Vegetation Dynamics and the Hemlock Decline in New England

Cited by 116 publications

References 26 publications

The Multiple Factors Explaining Decline in Mountain Forests: Historical Logging and Warming-Related Drought Stress is Causing Silver-Fir Dieback in the Aragón Pyrenees

The Multiple Factors Explaining Decline in Mountain Forests: Historical Logging and Warming-Related Drought Stress is Causing Silver-Fir Dieback in the Aragón Pyrenees

Decomposing the mid‐Holocene Tsuga decline in eastern North America

A paleolimnological archive of metal sequestration and release in the Cumberland Basin Marshes, Atlantic Canada

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