Assessing site signal preservation in reference chronologies for dendro-provenancing

Abstract

Regional differences in tree growth can be used to approximate the geographical provenance of ring-width series ('dendro-provenancing'). This method relies on cross-dated ringwidth series (reference chronologies) that are thought to represent the radial growth signal of trees in a given region. Reference chronologies are often established from ring-width series of living tree populations. Frequently, they are too short to allow for investigating the provenance of historical wood. Thus, references are extended by ring-width series from buildings and art-historical objects that exhibit best matching growth patterns with the living tree references. Yet, series from other provenances may erroneously be included. Thereby the local or regional growth signal of the references is progressively contaminated, but this has received little attention to date. I investigate this contamination risk using a simulation approach that allows for generating pseudo site chronologies that preserve the relevant statistical properties of the real site chronologies. While the exact provenance of historical wood is unknown, for simulated ring-width series the provenance is unambiguous. Hence, pseudo reference chronologies may be established while monitoring the signal mixture. Specifically, 15 site chronologies of Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) H. Karst.) from northeastern Switzerland were used to generate 15 pseudo site growth signals that span 1000 years. The simulation demonstrates that quasi uncontaminated references can be established in ideal circumstances for the study area. However, the thresholds for the similarity in between-series correlation must be very high. Even then, contaminated pseudo references occurred in rare cases during the simulation. Yet, elevation-specific pseudo references were established with lower thresholds. Simulation currently offers the only approach for assessing the contamination risk of reference chronologies, and it allows for elucidating the conditions under which acceptable levels of contamination can be guaranteed. Therefore, the present approach paves the way towards a practical simulation tool for dendroprovenancing.

Multi-elemental and Strontium-Neodymium Isotopic Signatures in Charred Wood: Potential for Wood Provenance Studies

“…Because of its robustness and precision, dendrochronology has become a standard Štulc et al provenancing method for deciduous oaks and other temperate tree species in Europe (Haneca et al 2009;Fowler & Bridge 2015). However, its application depends on well-established tree-ring chronologies (Towner 2002;Gut 2020), which are not available for all tree species and regions, particularly in the tropics (Edvardsson et al 2021). The requirement of a minimal tree ring number is not met for archaeological charred wood, which is usually found as small fragments (Marguerie & Hunot 2007).…”

Comparing the impact of live-tree versus historic-timber data on palaeoenvironmental inferences in tree-ring science, eastern North America

“…Dendroarchaeology, the application of tree-ring data and methods to archaeological materials, has diversified its tools and applications in the last few decades (Domínguez-Delmás, 2020; Pearl et al, 2020), including new developments in dendroprovenancing (Gut, 2020), stable isotope analysis, non-invasive methods of data collection and more recently, examining historical land-use change (e.g. Baillie, 2002; Billamboz, 2014; Büntgen et al, 2011; Domínguez-Delmás et al, 2015; Haneca et al, 2009; Muigg et al, 2020; Sass-Klaassen, 2002).…”