Early Holocene humidity patterns in the Iberian Peninsula reconstructed from lake, pollen and speleothem records

Morellón, Mario; Aranbarri, Josu; Moreno, Ana; González-Sampériz, Penélope; Valero‐Garcés, Blas L.

doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2017.11.016

Cited by 53 publications

(54 citation statements)

References 175 publications

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“…and decreasing mesophytes (González-Sampériz et al, 2017). The isotope values reveal a comparatively large increase in humidity relative to the YD, which is not reconstructed by sedimentary facies and palynology but is in agreement with other paleohydrological records of NE Spain and other regions from the Iberian Peninsula (Moreno et al, 2012;Morellón et al, 2014;González-Sampériz et al 2017).…”

Section: Holocenesupporting

confidence: 88%

Triple oxygen and hydrogen isotopes of gypsum hydration water for quantitative paleo-humidity reconstruction

Gázquez

Morellón

Bauska

et al. 2018

Earth and Planetary Science Letters

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Atmospheric relative humidity (RH) is an important parameter affecting vegetation yet palaeoproxies for RH are scarce and difficult to calibrate. Here we use triple oxygen ( 17 O and  18 O) and hydrogen (D) isotopes of structurally bounded gypsum hydration water (GHW) extracted from lacustrine gypsum to quantify past changes in paleo-atmospheric RH. An evaporation *Manuscript Click here to view linked References isotope mass balance model is used together with Monte Carlo simulations to determine the range of climatological conditions that simultaneously satisfy the stable isotope results of GHW, and with statistically robust estimates of uncertainty. We apply this method to reconstruct the isotopic composition of paleo-waters of Lake Estanya (NE Spain) and changes in atmospheric RH over the last glacial termination and Holocene (from ~15 to 0.6 cal. kyrs BP). The isotopic record indicates the driest conditions occurred during the Younger Dryas (YD; ~12-13 cal. kyrs BP). We estimate a RH of ~40-45% during the YD, which is ~30-35% lower than today. Because of the southward displacement of the Polar Front to ~42 o N, it was both windier and drier during the YD than the Bølling-Allerød period and Holocene. Mean atmospheric moisture gradually increased from the Preboreal to Early Holocene (~11 to 8 cal. kyrs BP, 50-60%), reaching 70-75% RH from ~7.5 cal. kyrs BP until present-day. We demonstrate that combining hydrogen and triple oxygen isotopes in GHW provides a powerful tool for quantitative estimates of past changes in relative humidity.

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Section: Holocenesupporting

confidence: 88%

Triple oxygen and hydrogen isotopes of gypsum hydration water for quantitative paleo-humidity reconstruction

Gázquez

Morellón

Bauska

et al. 2018

Earth and Planetary Science Letters

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“…Latitude and longitude emerged as weakly related variables (Fig. S5;Morellón et al, 2018;Vannière et al, 2011). MH group sites tend to be situated further east and north compared to LH sites (Fig.…”

Section: Drivers Of Holocene Fire Trends In Mediterranean Iberiamentioning

confidence: 93%

“…We merely suggest that turnover in the Mediterranean Iberian records considered here can be parsimoniously explained by the spread of human influence from Early Neolithic centres to more marginal sites over some 7500 years. This spatio-temporal pattern is unrelated to regional-scale climatic reconstructions based on vegetation-independent palaeoclimatic proxies (Aranbarri et al, 2014;Morellón et al, 2018;Roberts et al, 2011). Even so, humans undoubtedly tracked changes in climate and vegetation composition across the landscape, deciding where to farm, where to graze and where to burn to make the best of environmental opportunities (Walsh, 2014).…”

Section: Late Holocene Turnover In Open Vegetationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Climatic interpretations are weakened by a lack of regional coherence in inferred aridity phases (the entire Holocene is 'arid' according to different authors: see Fig. 8 in Schneider et al, 2016) and idiosyncratic ecological responses (Carrión et al, 2010;Morellón et al, 2018) due to complex bioclimatic heterogeneity inherent to Mediterranean landscapes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Humans take control of fire-driven diversity changes in Mediterranean Iberia’s vegetation during the mid–late Holocene

et al. 2019

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Fire regime changes are considered a major threat to future biodiversity in the Mediterranean Basin. Such predictions remain untested, however, given that fire regime changes and their ecological impacts occur over timescales that are too long for direct observation. Here we analyse centennial-3 and millennial-scale shifts in fire regimes and compositional turnover to track the consequences of fire regime shifts on Mediterranean vegetation diversity. We estimated rate-of-change, richness and compositional turnover (beta diversity) in 13 selected high-resolution palaeoecological records from Mediterranean Iberia and compared these to charcoal-inferred fire regime changes. Event sequence analysis showed fire regime shifts to be significantly temporally associated with compositional turnover, particularly during the last three millennia. We find that the timing and direction of fire and diversity change in Mediterranean Iberia are best explained by long-term human-environment interactions dating back perhaps 7500 years. Evidence suggests that Neolithic burning propagated a first wave of increasing vegetation openness and promoted woodland diversity around early farming settlements. Landscape transformation intensified around 5500-5000 cal. yr BP and accelerated during the last two millennia, as fire led to permanent transitions in ecosystem state. These fire episodes increased open vegetation diversity, decreased woodland diversity and significantly altered richness on a regional scale. Our study suggests that anthropogenic fires played a primary role in diversity changes in Mediterranean Iberia. Their millennia-long legacy in today's vegetation should be considered for biodiversity conservation and landscape management.

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“…Although many Western Mediterranean hydro-climatic records attest coincidences with Bond events, the forcing mechanisms and chronological correlations are not clear. (a) In the Western Mediterranean, multiple studies show that Holocene humidity changes are locally variable and of contrasting sign (Morellón et al, 2018). Whereas palaeoecological studies from the Pyrenees indicate environmental condi-tions that are more humid during Middle and Late Holocene North Atlantic cooling events (Pélachs et al, 2011), a prominent δ 18 O speleothem record from northern Spain (Smith et al, 2016) shows arid intervals.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Western Mediterranean hydro-climatic consequences of Holocene ice-rafted debris (Bond) events

et al. 2019

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Abstract. Gerard C. Bond established a Holocene series of North Atlantic ice-rafted debris events based on quartz and haematite-stained grains recovered from subpolar North Atlantic marine cores. These so-called “Bond events” document nine large-scale and multi-centennial North Atlantic cooling phases that might be linked to a reduced thermohaline circulation. Regardless of the high prominence of the Holocene North Atlantic ice-rafted debris record, there are critical scientific comments on the study: the Holocene Bond curve has not yet been replicated in other marine archives of the North Atlantic and there exist only very few palaeoclimatic studies that indicate all individual Bond events in their own record. Therefore, evidence of consistent hydro-climatic teleconnections between the subpolar North Atlantic and distant regions is not clear. In this context, the Western Mediterranean region presents key hydro-climatic sites for the reconstruction of a teleconnection with the subpolar North Atlantic. In particular, variability in Western Mediterranean winter precipitation might be the result of atmosphere–ocean coupled processes in the outer-tropical North Atlantic realm. Based on an improved Holocene δ18O record from Lake Sidi Ali (Middle Atlas, Morocco), we correlate Western Mediterranean precipitation anomalies with North Atlantic Bond events to identify a probable teleconnection between Western Mediterranean winter rains and subpolar North Atlantic cooling phases. Our data show a noticeable similarity between Western Mediterranean winter rain minima and Bond events during the Early Holocene and an opposite pattern during the Late Holocene. There is evidence of an enduring hydro-climatic change in the overall Atlantic atmosphere–ocean system and the response to external forcing during the Middle Holocene. Regarding a potential climatic anomaly around 4.2 ka (Bond event 3) in the Western Mediterranean, a centennial-scale winter rain maximum is generally in-phase with the overall pattern of alternating “wet and cool” and “dry and warm” intervals during the last 5000 years.

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Early Holocene humidity patterns in the Iberian Peninsula reconstructed from lake, pollen and speleothem records

Cited by 53 publications

References 175 publications

Triple oxygen and hydrogen isotopes of gypsum hydration water for quantitative paleo-humidity reconstruction

Triple oxygen and hydrogen isotopes of gypsum hydration water for quantitative paleo-humidity reconstruction

Humans take control of fire-driven diversity changes in Mediterranean Iberia’s vegetation during the mid–late Holocene

Western Mediterranean hydro-climatic consequences of Holocene ice-rafted debris (Bond) events

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