Aran Islands, Western Ireland: Farming History and Environmental Change, Reconstructed from Field Surveys, Historical Sources, and Pollen Analyses

Holocene Vegetation Dynamics, Landscape Change and Human Impact in Western Ireland as Revealed by Multidisciplinary, Palaeoecological Investigations of Peat Deposits and Bog-Pine in Lowland Connemara

“…Apart from this fluctuation, AP curves in the peat samples show relatively little variation. The AP appears to have a considerable long-distance transported component, a view supported by the consistent records for Fagus and Carpinus, which are usually regarded as non-native, i.e., late introductions to Ireland [16] (for a contrary view, see [86]). The very low values for Pinus (mostly 0.1-0.3%) that commence at c. 2.7 ka and continue to near the top of the profile are likewise interpreted as due to long-distance transport, as pine was probably locally and regionally extinct at this time [60,85].…”

“…The interruption, or at least a substantial lull, in farming that occurs in the late Iron Age, i.e., the LIAL, is the main feature of the late Iron Age/early Medieval transition (transition from prehistory to the historical period in Ireland). The LIAL is known to facilitate regeneration of woody vegetation that may involve various shrubs such as hazel, birch, juniper, and tall trees such as ash and yew (see, for example, [16,59]). At Derryinver, this feature is expressed by a strong regeneration in birch and can be seen especially in DYR V and VI, where it spans the intervals c. 1.6-1.25 ka (350-700 CE) and 1.55-1.15 ka (400-800 CE), respectively.…”

“…This was of major environmental concern at the time [14], but it is also of interest in a pollen analytical context, in that it shows that, even in a region where Atlantic westerlies and south-westerlies predominate, atmospheric transport from east to west can be considerable under particular atmospheric conditions [15]. This has implications for interpreting fossil pollen data and is especially pertinent to the question of long-distance pollen transport and its implications for the interpretation of tree pollen with low representation in Irish pollen profiles [16].…”

Younger Dryas and Holocene environmental change at the Atlantic fringe of Europe derived from lake‐sediment stable‐isotope records from western Ireland

“…2). The fields are nowadays under pasture but, until relatively recently, were often cultivated and carried mainly potatoes, rye and oats (O'Connell & Molloy 2019). Though icecovered in the last glaciation (Peters et al 2015), glacial deposits consist largely of limestone and granite erratics (Feehan 1994).…”

“…The investigations described in this paper formed part of the EU‐funded TIMECHS ( Timing and Mechanisms of Holocene Climate Change in NW Europe ) project (TIMECHS ), a multidisciplinary investigation of a 14.3‐m‐long Lateglacial and Holocene sediment sequence recovered from the deepest part of An Loch Mór in mid‐August 1996 (Molloy & O'Connell ). Publications are available relating to pollen (Molloy & O'Connell , ; O'Connell & Molloy ), tephrochronology (Chambers et al . ), inorganic geochemistry (Schettler & Romer ; Schettler et al .…”