Anthropogenic Transformation of the Vegetation in the Immediate Vicinity of the Settlement Complex at Poganowo (Mrągowo Lakeland, Ne Poland)

Abstract

Ab stractThe re sults of pol len, non-pol len palynomorph and microcharcoal par ti cle anal y ses of de pos its from a small pond in north east ern Po land are pre sented. The study fo cused on hu man-in duced veg e ta tion changes that oc curred in a close vi cin ity of the set tle ment com plex at Poganowo dur ing the Mid dle Ages (ca 10 th -16 th cen tu ries). We dis tin guished three phases of hu man im pact. First and third phases cor re spond to in ten si fied set tle ment ac tiv ity. The sec ond phase was a pe riod when hu man ac tiv ity de creased and wood land re gen er a tion took place. The high in ci dence of the par asitic fun gus Kretzschmaria deusta in a lo cal for est stand dur ing the third phase was si mul ta neous with nu mer ous spores of coprophilous fungi (Sordaria-type and Cercophora-type). We con sider that Kretzschmaria deusta in hab ited the roots and bases of tree trunks dam aged by dig ging and graz ing an i mals.Key words: hu man im pact, pol len anal y sis, fun gal spores, Masuria, Mid dle Ages. Mansuscipt re ceived 1 December 2014, ac cepted 1 June 2015 IN TRO DUC TIONA use of in di ca tor char ac ter is tics of some plant taxa, as well as of other or gan isms, is a fun da men tal method in palaeo ec ol ogy, en abling re con struc tion of past en vi ronments (e.g. Birks, 2003;Lata³owa et al., 2013). Among the microfossils that are ob served in pol len slides, fungi, al gae and other non-pol len palynomorphs (NPP) have be come partic u larly im por tant, be cause of their po ten tial to im prove recon struc tion of past eco sys tems (van Geel, 2001;van der Lin den et al., 2012). Van Geel and Aptroot (2006) un derlined that fun gal re mains are of high po ten tial in this con text. In par tic u lar, these au thors em pha sized the im por tance of fun gal taxa with well-char ac ter ized bi o log i cal and eco log ical re quire ments, e.g. Sporormiella sp. and Sordaria sp., which are in di ca tors for dung, or Kretzschmaria deusta, a par a site on de cay ing wood, in di cat ing pres ence of their host trees. How ever, a palaeo eco logi cal po ten tial of fun gal remains has not yet been fully ex plored. We pres ent re sults of palynological anal y sis in the frame work of in ter dis ci plin ary re search pro ject con ducted in the set tle ment com plex at Poganowo Wyczó³kowski et al., 2013). This set tle ment com plex is lo cated en tirely in a for est, and nearby there are nu mer ous small peat bogs and ponds suitable for lo cal-scale veg e ta tion re con struc tions (com pare Sugita et al., 2007). Our main ob jec tive was to study transfor ma tion of veg e ta tion caused by hu man ac tiv ity. Moreover, by the ap pli ca tion of NPP and microcharcoal par ti cle anal y sis we tried to char ac ter ize farm ing mod els, as sum ing the pos si bil ity of at trib ut ing the pres ence of spores of coprophilous fungi (e.g. Sordaria-type, Sporormiella-type) to land-use prac tices, par tic u larly hus bandry. AR CHAE O LOG I CAL AND HIS TOR I CAL BACK GROUNDThe set tle ment com plex at Poganowo ...

Was it ‘terra desolata’? Conquering and colonizing the medieval Prussian wilderness in the context of climate change.

“…In addition, if oak woods were used as pastures, such management most probably led to subsequent changes in woodland composition and structure, which were connected with the prevention of forest succession. The issue of the significant spread of Quercus in the area situated close to the investigated sites was recently discussed by Szal et al (2015). These authors suppose that the observed changes in species composition, mainly the dominance of Quercus , developed under the substantial influence of human activity in the medieval period and to some extent were associated with moderate livestock grazing in woodland.…”

“…Moreover, a significant spread of Quercus was accompanied by an increase in spores of coprophilous and parasitic fungi. Szal et al (2015) considered that grazing animals caused damage to the roots and trunks of oak trees, triggering infections with Kretzschmaria deusta . Also, in our record, significant values of Quercus and Carpinus were accompanied by an increase in the abundance of Kretzschmaria deusta and coprophilous fungi (Figures 3 and 4) and might be connected with woodland pasturing practice on the regional scale.…”

Mikrofosylia pozapyłkowe w torfach Polesia Lubelskiego i ich wartość wskaźnikowa

“…2002;Cugny i in. 2010;Mazurkiewicz-Zapałowicz, Okuniewska-Nowaczyk 2015;Szal et al 2015;Revelles i in. 2016), a także ocenie zmian paleohydrologicznych (van geel i in.…”