Patterned fen development in northern Scotland: Hypothesis testing and comparison with ombrotrophic blanket peats

Abstract

Charman, D. 1995. Patterned fen development in northern Scotland: hypothesis testing and comparison with ombrotrophic blanket peats.ABSTRACT: Patterned fens are part of the diverse Holocene peatland landscape of the Flow Country, northern Scotland. Their present vegetation and morphology allies them with boreal systems in Scandinavia and North America. However, previous work has shown that their mode of formation is rather different and has suggested a developmental model in which the poor fens have formed only recently and have arisen as a result of local hydrological change. These ideas are tested here by morphological, stratigraphical and macrofossil studies on three additional patterned fens covering a wider geographical and ecological range. TWO sites corroborate the ]ourml of Quaternary Science hypotheses of the earlier study, and one site which refutes the earlier findings can be shown to be dependent on different topographic controls. A comparison of two patterned fens with an ombrotrophic mire site in the same area shows that hydroseral processes dominate the early development of individual components of the mire complex. The time of initiation of patterned fens coincides with increasing surface wetness on the ombrotrophic mire. This may be due to climatic change and/or the coalescence of the constituent parts of the present integrated blanket mire system. The hydrological changes arising from this led to the emergence of the springs that currently supply the patterned fens with their water and elevated nutrient levels. The study supports the idea that landscape-scale research and conservation are essential for the understanding and hydrological integrity of blanket mire landscapes such as the Flow Country.

Replicability and variability of the recent macrofossil and proxy-climate record from raised bogs: field stratigraphy and macrofossil data from Bolton Fell Moss and Walton Moss, Cumbria, England

“…These data are also consonant with the bog-wide and small-scale changes recorded by Barber (1981), Smith (1985), Wimble (1986) and Svensson (1988b), as well as in blanket bogs by Moore (1977), Smart (1982), Charman (1995) and by Tallis (1995Tallis ( , 1997. Although there is evidence that not all cores taken from bogs show more or less simultaneous changes (e.g.…”

Modelling past, present and future peatland carbon accumulation across the pan-Arctic region

“…Under these conditions, some peatlands could sequester more C (Charman et al, 2013), while others could turn into C sources and degrade (Ise et al, 2008;Fan et al, 2013). Permafrost peatlands are sensitive ecosystems and respond quite rapidly to temperature change and other aspects of climate (Christensen et al, 2004).…”

“…However, while some sites in this region are reported as being quite productive (21.3 ± 3.7 g C m −2 yr −1 ; Anderson, 2002), long-term CAR estimates are available for relatively few sites (Charman, 1995;Anderson, 1998), making a comparison difficult. The points that fall in the British Isles showed lower modelled LARCA (12-14 g C m −2 yr −1 ) values than the observed literature range, indicating shortcomings in the simulation of local hydrological conditions or a possible bias in the climate forcing of our model.…”

A method for modelling peat depth in blanket peatlands

“…Future investigations could consider the role of other topographic variables. Stratigraphic studies of blanket peatland have shown that underlying topography is often more complex than surface topography causing local variability in depth (Tallis, 1991 and Charman, 1992, 1995). As surface topographic values were used, underlying variability would not have been represented in this study, and this may be an additional source of error.…”