Plant landscape reconstruction above the current timberline at the Monte Cimone and Corno alle Scale mountain areas (Northern Apennines, Italy) during the Late Holocene: The evidence from soil charcoal

Abstract

This paper presents the first pedoanthracological study carried out on two mountains of the Northern Apennines, Monte Cimone, and Corno alle Scale, where the results provided new palaeoenvironmental data. The pedoantracological sampling followed an elevation gradient from the current timberline to the highest possible elevation, also adapted to the geomorphological characteristics of the study areas. Based on radiocarbon datings (16 at Monte Cimone and 9 at Corno alle Scale), the soil charcoal fragments provided data about the vegetation dynamics and plant landscape reconstruction, primarily indicating the Late Holocene. The landscape over the last 3000 years appears very similar to the current one with very small altitudinal variations of the timberline and treeline. The present study shows a lack of radiocarbon dates for the Middle Holocene and two hypotheses are discussed to explain this finding. Data suggest that past fires were locally linked to periods of climate optimum and possibly with the management of natural resources (especially animal grazing) by human societies. Some questions concerning the absence of Abies alba, today only present as plantation and normally associated with Fagus sylvatica at these latitudes, are discussed.

Topoclimate effect on treeline elevation depends on the regional framework: A contrast between Southern Alps (New Zealand) and Apennines (Italy) forests

“…The most likely explanation of the low F. sylvatica treeline at the southern exposure (Figure 2 ) in the Apennines lies in the complex interaction between climate (e.g., freezing temperature, short growing season, and summer drought) and past human disturbance that shaped the actual treeline over the centuries, which goes beyond the differences imposed by the slope exposure itself. To date, concrete evidence of anthropogenic impact on treeline elevation along the Apennine chain emerged (Benatti et al, 2019 ; Brown et al, 2013 ; Compostella & Caccianiga, 2017 ). In the subalpine belt, centuries of logging and coppicing promoted vegetative reproduction from stump sprouting rather than clonal layering from basal branches (Saulino et al, 2022 ).…”

“…This is in line with a contemporary study of Batllori and Gutiérrez ( 2008 ) suggesting that treeline dynamics of Pinus uncinata in the Pyrenees have been widely affected by local anthropogenic activities. In addition, Bonanomi et al ( 2018 ) reported that the present Italian Apennines' Fagus sylvatica treeline is several hundred meters below its climatic potential because of widespread land‐use change, as confirmed from several paleoecological findings (e.g., Benatti et al, 2019 ; Brown et al, 2013 ). Therefore, any hypotheses of treeline dynamics, at local than global scales, in response to climate warming should at least consider the complex interaction among thermal requirements, physiological stressors, and disturbance regime, especially in mountains with a long history of human exploitation (Ameztegui et al, 2016 ).…”

“…In this regard, we again relate these warm isotherms of F. sylvatica treelines to the long history of non-climate anthropogenic drivers that, over the centuries, affected Apennines' treeline position (Vacchiano et al, 2017), as well in other European regions (Malanson et al, 2011, and therein references). Today, these anthropogenic treelines (sensu Holtmeier & Broll, 2005) along the Apennines lie several hundred meters below the climatic potential of F. sylvatica (e.g., Benatti et al, 2019), as also indirectly demonstrated by Bonanomi et al (2018Bonanomi et al ( , 2020. This would be the main reason why compared to the Southern Alps, the Apennine treeline shows a consistently higher isotherm ("too warm") for the temperatures of the warmest month, in particular for the subalpine belt that was in the past subjected to more extensive human exploitation, i.e., peaking below 1900 m a.s.l.…”

Pedoanthracology sheds light the ancientness of the pastoral highlands of three mediterranean mountain: Sierra de Gredos (Spain), southeast Massif Central (France), and northern Apennines (Italy)

“…Each pit occupied an area of approximately 0.3 m 2 . The sampling was carried out by stripping the soil in increments of 5-10 cm, starting from the surface and working down to the bedrock, imitating archeological methodology (Bal and Garcia-Álvarez, 2022;Benatti et al, 2019). About 5 kg of wet soil were collected from each sampling level.…”

Clonality drives structural patterns and shapes the community assemblage of the Mediterranean Fagus sylvatica subalpine belt

“…Since its range distribution is confined below the climatic treeline, F. sylvatica's upper elevation limit across the Apennines is more properly a species range limit (Körner, 2021), where past anthropogenic disturbances (Bonanomi et al, 2018) are prevailed on the eco-physiological limitations to the growth processes commonly related to the freezing tolerance (Körner, 2012a). Apennine beech forests are also known to be prominent examples of human-shaped forest landscapes, where the forest cover was manipulated starting from the late Holocene (Compostella et al, 2013;Benatti et al, 2019;Morales-Molino et al, 2021). For centuries, along the Italian Apennines' mountain belt (from a latitude of 38 • to 44 • N), silviculture has been involved mostly in coppicing with the removal of the larger shoots from the stools (Coppini and Hermanin, 2007).…”