A high-resolution record of climatic change in Elk Lake, Minnesota for the last 1500 years

Dean, Walter E.; Bradbury, James; Anderson, Ryan; Báder, László; Dieterich-Rurup, K. V.

doi:10.3133/ofr94578

Cited by 18 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…One possible productivity association might be as follows: if the clastic material is brought in mainly by wind rather than the two intermittent streams, then decreased clastic in#ux would mean less windy conditions, and, if this occurred during the summer, it might permit more intense blooms of cyanobacteria with a greater #ux of C-enriched OC to the sediments and enrichment of the DIC pool in C (heavier carbon in precipitated marl). A similar lowwind-productivity connection was proposed by Dean et al (1994) for Elk Lake, Clearwater County, for the period from 1300 to 1550 cal. yr BP.…”

Section: Aridity Cycles In Last 2000 Yrmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…8). Most of the sediment components that accumulated in Elk Lake during the Holocene are autochthonous or biogenic, and form distinct annual laminae (varves; Anderson, 1993;Dean, 1993;Dean et al, 1994). The main allochthonous component is detrital-clastic material, as measured by bulk-sediment concentrations of aluminum, sodium, potassium, titanium, and quartz, entering the lake mostly as eolian dust (Dean, 1993;Dean et al, 1996).…”

Section: Aridity Cycles In Last 2000 Yrmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Holocene environmental and climatic change in the Northern Great Plains as recorded in the geochemistry of sediments in Pickerel Lake, South Dakota

Dean

Schwalb

2000

Quaternary International

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The sediments in Pickerel Lake, northeastern South Dakota, provide a continuous record of climatic and environmental change for the last 12000 yr. Sediments deposited between 12 and 6 ka (radiocarbon) show extreme variations in composition, oxygen and carbon isotopic composition of bulk carbonate, carbon isotopic composition of organic matter, and magnetic susceptibility. These variations re#ect changes in sources of moisture, regional vegetation types, precipitation}evaporation balance, ground-and surface-water in#ux, water residence time, erosion, lake productivity, water level, and water temperature. The total carbonate content of late Pleistocene sediments steadily increased from (20% at the base of the core to as much as 80% in sediments deposited between 11 and 9 ka. By about 8 ka, the total carbonate content of the sediments had declined to about 40% where it remained with little variation for the past 8 kyr, suggesting relatively stable conditions. There are marked increases in values of C and O in bulk carbonate, and C of organic matter, in sediments deposited between 10 and 6 ka as evaporation increased, and the vegetation in the watershed changed from forest to prairie. This shift toward more O-enriched carbonate may also re#ect a change in source or seasonality of precipitation. During this early Holocene interval the organic carbon (OC) content of the sediments remained relatively low (2}3%), but then increased rapidly to 4.5% between 7 and 6 ka, re#ecting the rapid transition to a prairie lake. The OC content #uctuates slightly between 4 and 6% in sediments deposited over the past 6 kyr. Like OC and total carbonate, most variables measured show little variation in the 13 m of sediment deposited over the past 6 kyr, particularly when compared with early Holocene variations. Although the magnetic susceptibility of this upper 13 m of sediment is generally low ((10 SI units), the upper six meters of the section is marked by striking 1 m cycles (ca. 400}500 yr periodicity) in susceptibility. These cycles are interpreted as being due to variations in the in#ux of eolian detrital-clastic material. Century-scale cyclic variations in di!erent proxy variables for aridity and eolian activity from sediments deposited over the past 2000 yr in other lakes in the northern Great Plains, as well as in sand dune activity, suggest that aridity cycles were the dominant feature of late Holocene climate of the northern Great Plains.

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Section: Aridity Cycles In Last 2000 Yrmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Aridity Cycles In Last 2000 Yrmentioning

confidence: 99%

Holocene environmental and climatic change in the Northern Great Plains as recorded in the geochemistry of sediments in Pickerel Lake, South Dakota

Dean

Schwalb

2000

Quaternary International

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“…Nine detailed studies of Minnesota paleoclimates have inferred episodes of drought or low annual precipitation rates beginning at AD 1340 6 150 yr (estimated age 6 SD) and ending by AD 1650 6 170 yr; we found no detailed research from Minnesota that did not record extraordinary drought during this period. The evidence for drought derives from fossil pollen data (at AD 1325-1650, Gajewski 1988AD 1300-1400and 1660-1710, St. Jacques et al 2008, fire history data (AD 1325-1650, Clark 1988), oxygen isotopes (e.g., AD 1150-1350 and 1500-1700, Tian et al 2006), peat deposits (e.g., a hiatus in peat accumulation from AD 1340-1810, Booth et al 2006), diatoms (e.g., AD 1450-1750, Dean et al 1994, and aeolian deposition in lakes (e.g., after AD 1150, Dean 1997, Nelson andHu 2008;see Fig. 2B).…”

Section: Evidence Of the Big Woods Droughtmentioning

confidence: 99%

Woodland‐to‐forest transition during prolonged drought in Minnesota after ca. AD 1300

Shuman

Henderson

Plank

et al. 2009

Ecology

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Interactions among multiple causes of ecological perturbation, such as climate change and disturbance, can produce "ecological surprises." Here, we examine whether climate-fire-vegetation interactions can produce ecological changes that differ in direction from those expected from the effects of climate change alone. To do so, we focus on the "Big Woods" of central Minnesota, USA, which was shaped both by climate and fire. The deciduous Big Woods forest replaced regional woodlands and savannas after the severity of regional fire regimes declined at ca. AD 1300. A trend toward wet conditions has long been assumed to explain the forest expansion, but we show that water levels at two lakes within the region (Wolsfeld Lake and Bufflehead Pond) were low when open woodlands were transformed into the Big Woods. Water levels were high instead at ca. 2240-795 BC when regional fire regimes were most severe. Based on the correlation between water levels and fire-regime severity, we infer that prolonged or repeated droughts after ca. AD 1265 reduced the biomass and connectivity of fine fuels (grasses) within the woodlands. As a result, regional fire severity declined and allowed tree populations to expand. Tree-ring data from the region show a peak in the recruitment of key Big Woods tree species during the AD 1930s drought and suggest that low regional moisture balance need not have been a limiting factor for forest expansion. The regional history, thus, demonstrates the types of counterintuitive ecosystem changes that may arise as climate changes in the future.

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“…Although less tree-ring data are available for this time compared to that for the 16 th century, long moisture-sensitive tree-ring chronologies document persistent drought conditions in the western Great Plains, the southwestern U.S., the western Great Basin, and the Sierra Nevada (e.g., Weakly,352 C. A. Woodhouse Paleo perspective on hydroclimatic variability 1965; Grissino-Mayer, 1996;Hughes and Graumlich, 1996). Less finely resolved paleoclimatic data from lake sediments in the Great Plains and submerged stumps in the Sierra Nevada also support evidence for widespread drought about this time (Dean et al, 1994b;Fritz et al, 2000;Stine, 1994;Woodhouse and Overpeck, 1998). Ni et al (2002) recently developed cool season precipitation reconstructions from tree rings for climate divisions in Arizona and New Mexico.…”

Section: "The Great Drought" Of the 13 Th Century And The Ancient Puementioning

confidence: 99%

A paleo perspective on hydroclimatic variability in the western United States

Woodhouse

2004

Aquat. Sci.

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Aquatic resources management has become increasingly challenging as human demands on water supplies compete with the needs of natural ecosystems, particularly in arid lands. A wide range of factors, both natural and human, influence aquatic environments, but an important underlying component is climate variability. Instrumental records of hydroclimatic variability from precipitation, streamflow, and snowpack are limited to 100 years or less in most areas of the western U.S., and are too short to provide more than a subset of the full range of natural climate variability. Paleoclimatic proxy data from a variety of sources can be used to extend inAquatic Sciences strumental records of climate back centuries to tens of thousands of years and longer. In this review, four drought events over the past three millennia, each documented with a number of proxy records, illustrate natural hydroclimatic variability characteristics over the western U.S. Although a small sample of paleoclimate data, these four events exemplify the wide range of natural hydroclimatic variability over space and time. Climate is now, and will continue to be, impacted by human activities, but natural climatic variability will likely be an important underlying factor in future climate variability and change.

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A high-resolution record of climatic change in Elk Lake, Minnesota for the last 1500 years

Cited by 18 publications

References 10 publications

Holocene environmental and climatic change in the Northern Great Plains as recorded in the geochemistry of sediments in Pickerel Lake, South Dakota

Holocene environmental and climatic change in the Northern Great Plains as recorded in the geochemistry of sediments in Pickerel Lake, South Dakota

Woodland‐to‐forest transition during prolonged drought in Minnesota after ca. AD 1300

A paleo perspective on hydroclimatic variability in the western United States

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