A Holocene Record of Vegetation Change and Mountain Pine Beetle Outbreaks at Lake of the Woods, Montana, USA

Watt, Jennifer H.; Brunelle, Andrea; Brewer, Simon; Bentz, Barbara; Morris, Jesse L.; DeRose, R. Justin

doi:10.3398/064.082.0308

Cited by 1 publication

(2 citation statements)

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“…1 and 3 ). Diseases and pests are another species interaction which has caused well-documented vegetation change in the past, e.g., northern Rockies pine beetles during the Holocene ( 9 , 11 ) or recent emerald ash borer outbreaks ( 47 ). However, the effects of disease are usually spatially patchy resulting in minimal signal within our dataset.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 8 ), disease outbreaks (e.g., refs. 9 – 11 ), as well as human-caused or mediated processes like anthropogenic climate change, introduced species, land-use change, and disturbance regimes ( 12 , 13 ). Some processes are synergistic, such as vegetation changes associated with the Late Quaternary megafaunal extinctions, likely caused by both climate and human impacts (e.g., refs.…”

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North American pollen records provide evidence for macroscale ecological changes in the Anthropocene

Stegner,

Spanbauer

2023

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Recent global changes associated with anthropogenic activities are impacting ecological systems globally, giving rise to the Anthropocene. Critical reorganization of biological communities and biodiversity loss are expected to accelerate as anthropogenic global change continues. Long-term records offer context for understanding baseline conditions and those trajectories that are beyond the range of normal fluctuation seen over recent millennia: Are we causing changes that are fundamentally different from changes in the past? Using a rich dataset of late Quaternary pollen records, stored in the open-access and community-curated Neotoma database, we analyzed changes in biodiversity and community composition since the end Pleistocene in North America. We measured taxonomic richness, short-term taxonomic loss and gain, first/last appearances (FAD/LAD), and abrupt community change. For all analyses, we incorporated age-model uncertainty and accounted for differences in sample size to generate conservative estimates. The most prominent signals of elevated vegetation change were seen during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition and since 200 calendar years before present (cal YBP). During the Pleistocene-Holocene transition, abrupt changes and FADs were elevated, and from 200 to −50 cal YBP, we found increases in short-term taxonomic loss, FADs, LADs, and abrupt changes. Taxonomic richness declined from ~13,000 cal YBP until about 6,000 cal YBP and then increased until the present, reaching levels seen during the end Pleistocene. Regionally, patterns were highly variable. These results show that recent changes associated with anthropogenic impacts are comparable to the landscape changes that took place as we moved from a glacial to interglacial world.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%