Abstract
Most of the world’s mountain glaciers have been retreating for more than a century in response to climate change. Glacier retreat is evident on all continents, and the rate of retreat has accelerated during recent decades. Accurate, spatially explicit information on the position of glacier margins over time is useful for analyzing patterns of glacier retreat and measuring reductions in glacier surface area. This information is also essential for evaluating how mountain ecosystems are evolving due to climate warming and the attendant glacier retreat. Here, we present a non-comprehensive spatially explicit dataset showing multiple positions of glacier fronts since the Little Ice Age (LIA) maxima, including many data from the pre-satellite era. The dataset is based on multiple historical archival records including topographical maps; repeated photographs, paintings, and aerial or satellite images with a supplement of geochronology; and own field data. We provide ESRI shapefiles showing 728 past positions of 94 glacier fronts from all continents, except Antarctica, covering the period between the Little Ice Age maxima and the present. On average, the time series span the past 190 years. From 2 to 46 past positions per glacier are depicted (on average: 7.8).
Highlights
Mannaki Whenua—Landcare Research, Soils and Landscapes, 54 Gerald St, Lincoln 7608, New Zealand; Institute of Water Problems and Hydro-Energy, Kyrgyz National Academy of Sciences, Frunze 533, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences (DISAT), University of Milano-Bicocca, 20126 Milano, Italy; 4.0/)
Our primary objective was not to obtain a complete, global scale dataset with equal coverage from all the continents, but instead to collate high-quality data with multiple positions from several glaciers around the world
Glacier name, dating, source, GLIMS id, and maximum extent are reported in the associated table
Summary
Most of the world’s mountain glaciers have been losing mass since the second half of 19th century due to the rise of global temperature [1]. High-quality data on margins are available since the end of the LIA (from the late 19th century in part of Northern Europe, to as early as the 17th–18th century in other mountain ranges such as the tropical Andes; see e.g., [20]) These data have been obtained through geomorphologic analyses mainly based on morpho-stratigraphic positions, morphology, and relationships of moraines which is further dated by in situ relative and absolute dating methods (e.g., radiocarbon, lichenometry, dendrochronology, optically stimulated luminescence, and terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide dating), analysis of old/repeated photographs and paintings, historical archives and maps including topographical maps, and remotely sensed data [21,22,23,24].
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