“…The long-term perspective of paleolimnological approaches, which pre-date high-quality records of water chemistry and/or ecological monitoring, makes paleolimnology well-suited to study cultural eutrophication, a process that typically occurs over decades. Paleolimnological approaches have been developed to study eutrophication (reviewed by Davidson and Jeppesen, 2013) have included changes in: (i) the relative composition and/or abundance of proxies of primary producers from lake sediments, including sub-fossil pigments, diatoms and other algal remains, as well as changes in plant composition from aquatic macrophytes; (ii) changes in the composition, abundance and size structure of many invertebrate groups (e.g., cladocera, and chironomids); and (iii) chemical proxies including direct measurements of total phosphorus (TP), that can be problematic (Ginn et al, 2012), as well as isotopic changes in carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and silica (Si) that can be related to changes in lake production (Davidson and Jeppesen, 2013). Given the limitations of many approaches and the complexities of lake ecosystems, most researchers advocate a multiproxy approach to reconstruct changes in nutrient dynamics, as well as a combination of both limnological and paleolimnological approaches (e.g., Battarbee et al, 2005).…”