A high-resolution Late Holocene landscape ecological history inferred from an intramontane basin in the Western Taurus Mountains, Turkey

Abstract

Late Holocene vegetation and geomorphological history is reconstructed from a 800 cm long high-resolution palynological and sedimentological record sampled from Bereket, a 6.3 km 2 semi-arid to sub-humid intramontane basin in the Western Taurus Mountains (southwest Turkey). The well-dated Bereket record provides from cal. 360 BC to cal. AD ∼400 a unique record of biennial-to-decadal landscape changes caused primarily by intensive human impacts against a background of global climate variations. During this period, land clearance with multiple fire episodes, intensive agricultural practices and grazing pressure profoundly altered the pre-existing warm mixed forest. Increasing moisture availability since cal. ∼280 BC has acted as a trigger to crop cultivation and mountain-adapted arboriculture starting with Juglans regia during the Beyşehir Occupation Phase. Pollen from olive groves have been recorded above 1400 m a.s.l. only at cal. ∼23 BC and have disappeared definitively at cal. AD ∼294. During this phase, the sediment accumulation rate was extremely high, reflecting landscape instability. From cal. AD 450 to recent times, the area has mainly recorded pasture and minor cultivation activities reflected in stable soils and thin colluvial depths.