Multi-proxy Methods Research Articles

Palaeolimnological Development of Lake Njargajavri, Northern Finnish Lapland, in a Changing Holocene Climate and Environment

This study used palaeolimnological approaches to determine how Holocene climatic and environmental changes affected aquatic assemblages in a subarctic lake. Sediments of the small Lake Njargajavri, in northern Finnish Lapland above the present treeline, were studied using multi-proxy methods. The palaeolimnological development of the lake was assessed by analyses of chironomids, Cladocera and diatoms. The lake was formed in the early Holocene and was characterized by prominent erosion and leaching from poorly developed soils before the establishment of birch forests, resulting in a high pH and trophic state. The lake level started to lower as early as ca. 10,200 cal. BP. In the resulting shallow basin, rich in aquatic mosses, pH decreased and a diverse cladoceran and chironomid assemblage developed. It is likely that there was a slight rise in the water level ca. 8000 cal. BP. Later, during the mid-Holocene characterized by low effective moisture detected elsewhere in Fennoscandia, the lake probably completely dried out; this is manifest as a hiatus in the stratigraphy. The sediment record continues from ca. 5000 cal. BP onwards as the lake formed again due to increased effective moisture. The new lake was characterized by very low pH. The possible spread of pine to the catchment and the development of heath community may have contributed to the unusually steep (for northern Fennoscandia) decline in pH via change in soils, together with the natural decrease in leaching of base cations. Furthermore, the change in pH may have been driven by cooling climate, affecting the balance of dissolved inorganic carbon in the lake.

Are multiproxy climate reconstructions robust?

64 climate reconstructions, based on regression of temperature fields on multi‐proxies and mutually distinguished by at least one of six standard criteria, cover an entire spread of millennial histories. No single criterion is accountable for the spread, which appears to depend on a complicated interplay of the criteria. The uncertainty is traced back to the fact that regression is applied here in an extrapolative manner, with millennial proxy variations exceeding the standard calibration scale by a factor of 5 and more. Even if linearity still holds for that larger domain the model error propagates in a way that is proportional to both the estimation error and the proxy variations, and is thus extrapolated accordingly. This is particularly critical for the parameter‐loaded multiproxy methods. Without a model error estimate and without techniques to keep it small, it is not clear how these methods can be salvaged to become robust.

The Origin and Evolution of Lake Vähä-Pitkusta, SW Finland – A Multi-Proxy Study of a Meromictic Lake

Lake Vaha-Pitkusta is a 35-m deep meromictic kettle-hole lake in SW Finland. The topmost 15cm of the sediment stratigraphy consists of black gyttja, representing the last ca. 600years. A sediment core from the deepest point was examined with multi-proxy methods to determine the origin and evolution of the basin, the onset of the meromictic conditions and the primary factors that initiated the meromictic processes. The results indicate that Lake Vaha-Pitkusta became isolated from the Baltic basin during the Yoldia Sea stage. After initial unstable sedimentary conditions the development continued steadily until ca. 2500–2300 cal.BP when there is indication of lake level rise and/or increased surface runoff, probably resulting from a cooler and moister climate. The diatom and cladoceran results indicate only a slight rise in the trophic state following the increased erosion. Pollen evidence suggests weak anthropogenic activity in the catchment during the last 1000 years, and this had only little effect on the trophic state, which remained rather low. Thus, it is most unlikely that the trophic state was the primary reason for the origin of meromixis, although it may have contributed to it. We tentatively suggest that the primary reason was the peculiar morphometric dimensions of Lake Vaha-Pitkusta (small, deep, sheltered from winds) which made it very sensitive and that even a very slight increase in soluble electrolytes may push it over the edge into meromixation. It is possible that this did not occur during the cold/moist period around ca. 2300 cal.BP but during the Medieval Climate Anomaly. Studies on sediment geochemistry are needed to verify this assumption.

Holocene paleohydrology and glacial history of the central Andes using multiproxy lake sediment studies

Here we document at century to millennial scale the regional changes of precipitation–evaporation from the late Pleistocene to present with multiproxy methods on a north–south transect of lake sites across the eastern cordillera of the central Andes. The transect of study sites covers the area from ∼14°S to 20°S and includes core studies from seven lakes and modern calibration water samples from twenty-three watersheds analyzed to constrain the down-core interpretations of stable isotopes and diatoms. We selected lakes in different hydrologic settings spanning a range of sensitivity to changes in the moisture balance. These include: (1) lakes directly receiving glacial meltwater, (2) overflowing lakes in glaciated watersheds, (3) overflowing lakes in watersheds without active glaciers, and (4) lakes that become closed basins during the dry season. The results of our current work on multiple lakes in the Bolivian Andes show that while the overall pattern of Holocene environmental change is consistent within the region, conditions were not always stable over centennial to over millennial timescales and considerable decadal- to century-scale climate variability is evident [Abbott et al., Quat. Res. 47 (1997) 70–80, Quat. Res. 47 (1997) 169–180, Quat. Sci. Rev. 19 (2000) 1801–1820; Polissar, Master's thesis, University of Massachusetts (1999)]. Comparison of the paleoclimate record from one well-studied site, Lago Taypi Chaka Kkota (LTCK), with others within the region illustrates a consistent overall pattern of aridity from the late glacial through the middle Holocene. Previous work noted a difference between the timing of water-level rise in Lake Titicaca ∼5.0–3.5 ka B.P. [Abbott et al., Quat. Res. 47 (1997) 169–180; Cross et al., Holocene 10 (2000) 21–32; Rowe et al., Clim. Change 52 (2002) 175–199] and the onset of wetter conditions at 2.3 ka B.P. in LTCK, a lake that drains into the southern end of Lake Titicaca [Abbott et al., Quat. Res. 47 (1997) 70–80]. Sedimentary and oxygen isotope evidence from Paco Cocha (13°54′S) located in the northern reaches of the expansive 57 000 km 2 Titicaca watershed, which spans ∼14°S to 17°S, indicates that glaciers returned to the watershed around 4.8 ka B.P. In addition, sedimentary and geochemical data from Llacho Kkota (15°07′S), located between LTCK (16°12′S) and Paco Cocha, indicate wetter conditions around 3.4 ka B.P. This suggests wetter conditions occurred first in the northern reaches of the Titicaca watershed and resulted in rising water levels in Lake Titicaca while the LTCK watershed remained unglaciated and seasonally desiccated. Comparison of the paleoclimate records from Paco Cocha, LTCK, and Potosi with other paleoclimate records from the region including Lake Titicaca and Nevado Sajama illustrates a consistent overall pattern of aridity from the late Pleistocene through the middle Holocene, but wetter conditions occurred in the northern areas first, and the aridity in the north was of shorter duration and less severe. The progressive increase in wet season (summer) insolation across the region during the Holocene likely resulted in an increasingly southward position and intensification of the zone of intense summer convection – known as the Intertropical Convergence Zone over the tropical Atlantic and Pacific. We suggest this is the cause of the overall pattern of increasingly later dates for the onset of wetter conditions moving north to south that we observe across the seven lakes discussed here that span four degrees of latitude. However, this does not explain the decadal- to century-scale variability that demonstrably exists at these same sites. Overall the last 2.3 ka has been the wettest period during the Holocene, but even during this relatively wet phase there are century-scale lowstands in lakes, including Titicaca, Llacho Kkota, Juntutuyo (17°33′S), and Potosi (19°38′S), and significant changes in the extent of glacial activity in the glaciated watersheds of Paco Cocha, LTCK, and Viscachani (16°11′S), indicating the continued sensitivity of the region to shifts in the moisture balance.

High-resolution multiproxy climatic records from ice cores, tree-rings, corals and documentary sources using eigenvector techniques and maps: assessment of recovered signal and errors

Palaeotemperature sensitive series from tree-rings, ice cores, corals and documentary sources are combined to producepalaeo summer-temperaturereconstructions (AD 1970-1761)and geographical eigenvector (EOF) maps in both hemispheres. They are compared favourably to those of existing summer-temperature average series. There are 51 palaeoseries in the Northern Hemisphere (mostly north of 40° N) and 16 series in the Southern Hemisphere. The statistics and significance of the palaeoreconstructions are examined by: (1) finding the correlation coefficient (palaeo to measured) as a function of the number and geographical distribution of the palaeo series; (2) developing and running a multiproxy model that generates pseudo series containing a signal and the same types and amounts of noise found in the various real palaeo series. The model reproduces the measured correlation coefficients and the eigenvector's (EOF) explained variances as functions of the number of sites. About 77% of the signal variance can be recovered with 51 well-distributed palaeo series and about 90% with greater than 100 series. The 1st eigenvector (EOF l) component maps in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres are fundamentally different, with the Northern having much less longitudinal variation than the Southern. This means (statistically) that simple hemispheric averages of summer temperature have more meaning in the Northern Hemisphere than in the Southern. Even though the various palaeoseries have different spectral biases, noise types and amounts, they were all used together and the common signal extracted. The results of this work strongly suggest that the multiproxy method is valid and that with enough sites most of the summer signal and geographical pattern can be extracted.