首页 | 本学科首页   官方微博 | 高级检索  
相似文献
 共查询到20条相似文献，搜索用时 15 毫秒
1.
Marine ice sheets are grounded on land which was below sea level before it became depressed under the ice-sheet load. They are inherently unstable and, because of bedrock topography after depression, the collapse of a marine ice sheet may be very rapid. In this paper equations are derived that can be used to make a quantitative estimate of the maximum size of a marine ice sheet and of when and how rapidly retreat would take place under prescribed conditions. Ice-sheet growth is favored by falling sea level and uplift of the seabed. In most cases the buttressing effect of a partially grounded ice shelf is a prerequisite for maximum growth out to the edge of the continental shelf. Collapse is triggered most easily by eustatic rise in sea level, but it is possible that the ice sheet may self-destruct by depressing the edge of the continental shelf so that sea depth is increased at the equilibrium grounding line.Application of the equations to a hypothetical “Ross Ice Sheet” that 18,000 yr ago may have covered the present-day Ross Ice Shelf indicates that, if the ice sheet existed, it probably extended to a line of sills parallel to the edge of the Ross Sea continental shelf. By allowing world sea level to rise from its late-Wisconsin minimum it was possible to calculate retreat rates for individual ice streams that drained the “Ross Ice Sheet.” For all the models tested, retreat began soon after sea level began to rise (～15,000 yr B.P.). The first 100 km of retreat took between 1500 and 2500 yr but then retreat rates rapidly accelerated to between 0.5 and 25 km yr?1, depending on whether an ice shelf was present or not, with corresponding ice velocities across the grounding line of 4 to 70 km yr?1. All models indicate that most of the present-day Ross Ice Shelf was free of grounded ice by about 7000 yr B.P. As the ice streams retreated floating ice shelves may have formed between promontories of slowly collapsing stagnant ice left behind by the rapidly retreating ice streams. If ice shelves did not form during retreat then the analysis indicates that most of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet would have collapsed by 9000 yr B.P. Thus, the present-day Ross Ice Shelf (and probably the Ronne Ice Shelf) serves to stabilize the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, which would collapse very rapidly if the ice shelves were removed. This provides support for the suggestion that the 6-m sea-level high during the Sangamon Interglacial was caused by collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet after climatic warming had sufficiently weakened the ice shelves. Since the West Antarctic Ice Sheet still exists it seems likely that ice shelves did form during Holocene retreat. Their effect was to slow and, finally, to halt retreat. The models that best fit available data require a rather low shear stress between the ice shelf and its sides, and this implies that rapid shear in this region encouraged the formation of a band of ice with a preferred crystal fabric, as appears to be happening today in the floating portions of fast bounded glaciers.Rebound of the seabed after the ice sheet had retreated to an equilibrium position would allow the ice sheet to advance once more. This may be taking place today since analysis of data from the Ross Ice Shelf indicates that the southeast corner is probably growing thicker with time, and if this persists then large areas of ice shelf must become grounded. This would restrict drainage from West Antarctic ice streams which would tend to thicken and advance their grounding lines into the ice shelf.  相似文献   

2.
We present marine sedimentologic and radiocarbon data for the timing of retreat of the largely marine-based Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Our findings indicate minimum estimates of deglaciation between 18,000 and 9000 calibrated years before present (cal yr BP), roughly in phase with the Northern Hemisphere deglaciation and eustatic sea-level rise. Our findings show this retreat occurred progressively from the outer, middle, and inner continental shelf regions, as well as progressively from the north to the south. Retreat initiated on the outer shelf of the northern Peninsula by 18,000 cal yr BP and continued southward by 14,000 cal yr BP on the outer shelf of Marguerite Bay, several thousand years earlier than estimated by numeric models. While individual cores yield estimates of glacial retreat that may vary up to ±1100 years, we note steps in the data occur at 14,000 and possibly 11,000 cal yr BP, coincidental to rapidly rising (eustatic) sea level, including the well documented melt water pulses (MWP 1a and 1b). These data support the hypothesis that rapidly rising sea level is associated with marine ice sheet destabilization, although additional dates are necessary to substantiate this finding. This study highlights problems with radiocarbon dating acid insoluble organic (AIO) matter in proximal Lateglacial sediments as well as the need for more accurate dating techniques.  相似文献   

3.
Radiocarbon dates from critical stratigraphic localities in southern British Columbia indicate that the growth history of the late Wisconsin Cordilleran Ice Sheet was different from that of most of the Laurentide Ice Sheet to the east. Much of southern British Columbia remained free of ice until after about 19,000 to 20,000 yr ago; only adjacent to the Coast Mountains is there a record of lowland glacier tongues in the interval 22,000 to 20,000 yr B.P. A major advance to the climax of late Wisconsin Cordilleran glacier ice in the northern States was not begun until after about 18,000 yr B.P. in the southwest of British Columbia and after about 17,500 yr B.P. in the southeast. The rate of glacier growth must have been very rapid in the two to three millennia prior to the climax, which has been dated in western Washington at shortly after 15,000 yr B.P.  相似文献   

4.
Radiocarbon age determination of a Greenland whale (Balaena mysticetus) vertebra from Melville Bugt in northwestern Greenland yields an age of 9259-8989 cal yr BP. The margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet in Melville Bugt was situated behind its AD 1950-2000 position in the early Holocene, at a similar position to that being reached following rapid retreat in recent years. Such an early deglaciation of areas close to the Greenland Ice Sheet is unusual. This probably reflects the unique glaciological setting resulting from the narrow fringe of ice-free islands and peninsulas and offshore waters with deep areas that characterize this part of Greenland. The timing of Greenland Ice Sheet retreat to its present margin varies significantly around Greenland.  相似文献   

5.
《Quaternary Research》1986,26(1):3-26
Denton and Hughes (1983, Quaternary Research 20, 125–144) postulated that sea level linked a global ice-sheet system with both terrestrial and grounded marine components during late Quaternary ice ages. Summer temperature changes near Northern Hemisphere melting margins initiated sea-level fluctuations that controlled marine components in both polar hemispheres. It was further proposed that variations of this ice-sheet system amplified and transmitted Milankovitch summer half-year insolation changes between 45 and 75°N into global climatic changes. New tests of this hypothesis implicate sea level as a major control of the areal extent of grounded portions of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, thus fitting the concept of a globally interlocked ice-sheet system. But recent atmospheric modeling results (Manabe and Broccoli, 1985, Journal of Geophysical Research 90, 2167–2190) suggest that factors other than areal changes of the grounded Antarctic Ice Sheet strongly influenced Southern Hemisphere climate and terminated the last ice age simultaneously in both polar hemispheres. Atmospheric carbon dioxide linked to high-latitude oceans is the most likely candidate (Shackleton and Pisias, 1985, Atmospheric carbon dioxide, orbital forcing, and climate. In “The Carbon Cycle and Atmospheric CO2: Natural Variations Archean to Present” (E. T. Sundquest and W. S. Broecker, Eds.), pp. 303–318. Geophysical Monograph 32, American Geophysical Union, Washington, D.C.), but another potential influence was high-frequency climatic oscillations (2500 yr). It is postulated that variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide acted through an Antarctic ice shelf linked to the grounded ice sheet to produce and terminate Southern Hemisphere ice-age climate. It is further postulated that Milankovitch summer insolation combined with a warm high-frequency oscillation caused marked recession of Northern Hemisphere ice-sheet melting margins and the North Atlantic polar front about 14,000 14C yr B.P. This permitted renewed formation of North Atlantic Deep Water, which could well have controlled atmospheric carbon dioxide (W. S. Broecker, D. M. Peteet, and D. Rind, 1985, Nature (London) 315, 21–26). Combined melting and consequent sea-level rise from the three warming factors initiated irreversible collapse of the interlocked global ice-sheet system, which was at its largest but most vulnerable configuration.  相似文献   

6.
New data from a deep-sea core in the eastern North Pacific Ocean indicate that the western margin of the Late Wisconsin Cordilleran Ice Sheet began to retreat from its maximum position after 15,600 yr B.P. Ice-rafted detritus is present in the core below the 15,600 yr B.P. level and was deposited while lobes of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet advanced across the continental shelf in Queen Charlotte Sound, Hecate Strait, and Dixon Entrance. The core data are complemented by stratigraphic evidence and radiocarbon ages from Quaternary exposures bordering Hecate Strait and Dixon Entrance. These indicate that piedmont lobes reached the east and north shores of Graham Island (part of the Queen Charlotte Islands) between about 23,000 and 21,000 yr B.P. Sometime thereafter, but before 15,000–16,000 yr B.P., these glaciers achieved their greatest Late Wisconsin extent. Radiocarbon ages of late-glacial and postglacial sediments from Queen Charlotte Sound, Hecate Strait, and adjacent land areas show that deglaciation began in these areas before 15,000 yr B.P. and that the shelf was completely free of ice by 13,000 yr B.P.  相似文献   

7.
The recent disintegration of Antarctic Peninsula ice shelves, and the associated accelerated discharge and retreat of continental glaciers, has highlighted the necessity of quantifying the current rate of Antarctic ice mass loss and the regional contributions to future sea-level rise. Observations of present day ice mass change need to be corrected for ongoing glacial isostatic adjustment, a process which must be constrained by geological data. However, there are relatively little geological data on the geometry, volume and melt history of the Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet (APIS) after Termination 1, and during the Holocene so the glacial isostatic correction remains poorly constrained. To address this we provide field constraints on the timing and rate of APIS deglaciation, and changes in relative sea-level (RSL) for the north-eastern Antarctic Peninsula based on geomorphological evidence of former marine limits, and radiocarbon-dated marine-freshwater transitions from a series of isolation basins at different altitudes on Beak Island. Relative sea-level fell from a maximum of c. 15 m above present at c. 8000 cal yr BP, at a rate of 3.91 mm yr?1 declining to c. 2.11 mm yr?1 between c. 6900–2900 cal yr BP, 1.63 mm yr?1 between c. 2900–1800 cal yr BP, and finally to 0.29 mm yr?1 during the last c. 1800 years. The new Beak Island RSL curve improves the spatial coverage of RSL data in the Antarctic. It is in broad agreement with some glacio-isostatic adjustment models applied to this location, and with work undertaken elsewhere on the Antarctic Peninsula. These geological and RSL constraints from Beak Island imply significant thinning of the north-eastern APIS by the early Holocene. Further, they provide key data for the glacial isostatic correction required by satellite-derived gravity measurements of contemporary ice mass loss, which can be used to better assess the future contribution of the APIS to rising sea-levels.  相似文献   

8.
《Quaternary Science Reviews》2005,24(14-15):1655-1671
During the glacial–interglacial transition that began subsequent to the Last Glacial Maximum approximately 21,000 calendar years ago, globally averaged (eustatic) sea-level rose by approximately 120 m as climate warmed to its current (Holocene) state. This rise of relative sea-level (RSL) did not occur smoothly, however, but was characterized by the occurrence of one or more episodes of extremely rapid increase. The most extreme of these events has come to be referred to as meltwater pulse 1a, and was initially identified in the coral based record of RSL history from the island of Barbados in the Caribbean Sea. Although it has usually been assumed that this episode of rapid RSL rise was derivative of a partial collapse of the northern hemisphere ice sheets, it has recently been suggested that this pulse could have originated in a dramatic melt-back of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. In this paper the arguments presented in favour of the southern hemisphere source are revisited in order to assess the plausibility of this alternative scenario.Based upon the analyses presented, it is concluded that the evidence previously provided in support of the southern hemisphere scenario is in fact unable to rule out an entirely northern hemisphere source for the meltwater pulse 1a. Since explicit evidence does exist that both the Laurentide and Fennoscandian ice sheets contributed to this event and that Antarctic ice sheet melting occurred significantly later, the southern hemisphere appears not to have been a prime mover of northern hemisphere events.  相似文献   

9.
The causes of Antarctic glaciation are analyzed by means of numeral experiments based on the three-dimensional thermodynamic model of a large ice sheet. Refrigeration of the climate between the Eocene and the Oligocene was due to the opening of the passage south of Australia and to the formation of the South Ring Stream. Calculations have shown that this led to the development of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet which might have existed in spite of relatively high temperatures of the surrounding ocean air. A new cooling of the climate in the Middle Miocene is connected with the fact that the South Ring Stream found its way through the Drake Passage glaciers spreading on to the Western Antarctic. Between Miocene and Pliocene, glaciation of the South Polar regions was at its maximum due to the regression of the world ocean. In Quaternary time, sea level was lowering due to the glaciation of the Northern Hemisphere, which resulted in glacier growth in the Antarctic. The anticipated warming of the climate due to the activity of man is not likely to bring about any considerable change in the size of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet.  相似文献   

10.
A numerical ice-sheet model was run in order to produce reconstructions of the Late Weichselian ice coverage of Franz Josef Land, Russian High Arctic. The model grid covers the archipelago and surrounding shelf, but does not include the whole Barents-Kara region or the extensive ice cover that may have built up there. One experiment, where rates of iceberg calving at the grounded margin were curtailed because of the assumed presence of permanent thick sea ice, yielded a single I.8 km-thick ice dome which covered the entire archipelago and surrounding sea. If, however, iceberg calving were included in the model's environmental input, the extent of the ice sheet would be limited to the periphery of the archipelago. If a large ice sheet existed over Franz Josef Land, the deglaciation of the islands may have been linked to the decay of the adjacent Barents-Kara Sea Ice Sheet, permitting iceberg calving (enhanced by relative sea-level rise) to occur. The introduction of a water-depth-related iceberg calving function at 15 000 yr ago forced an initial rapid rate of ice-sheet decay of 30 000 km3 1000 yr'. However, as the ice sheet thinned, and isostatic rebound began, the calculated rate of iceberg calving was reduced such that ice remained over the archipelago at 8000 yr ago. The model's failure to simulate complete ice-sheet decay by 8000 yr ago is at variance with radiocarbon-dated raised terraces on Franz Josef Land, which indicates the complete deglaciation of the islands at this time.  相似文献   

11.
The evolution of the southern Greenland Ice Sheet is interpreted from a synthesis of geological data and palaeoclimatic information provided by the ice-sheet cores. At the Last Glacial Maximum the ice margin would have been at the shelf break and the ice sheet was fringed by shelf ice. Virtually all of the present ice-free land was glaciated. The initial ice retreat was controlled by eustatic sea level rise and was mainly by calving. When temperatures increased, melt ablation led to further ice-margin retreat and areas at the outer coast and mountain tops were deglaciated. Retreat was interrupted by a readvance during the Neria stade that may correlate with the Younger Dryas cooling. The abrupt temperature rise at the Younger Dryas-Holocene transition led to a fast retreat of the ice margin, and after ∼9 ka BP the ice sheet was smaller than at present. Expansion of the ice cover began in the Late Holocene, with a maximum generally during the Little Ice Age. The greatest changes in ice cover occurred in lowland areas, i.e. in the region of the Qassimiut lobe. The date of the historical maximum advance shows considerable spatial variability and varies between AD 1600 and the present. Local anomalous readvances are seen at possibly 7-8 ka and at c. 2 ka BP. A marked relative sea level rise is seen in the Late Holocene; this is believed to reflect a direct glacio-isostatic response to increasing ice load.  相似文献   

12.
政府间气候变化专门委员会（IPCC）于2021年8月发布了第六次评估报告第一工作组报告《气候变化2021：自然科学基础》。该报告基于最新的观测和模拟研究,评估了冰冻圈变化的现状,并采用CMIP6模式对未来变化进行了预估。报告明确指出,近十多年来冰冻圈呈现加速萎缩状态：北极海冰面积显著减小、厚度减薄、冰量迅速减少;格陵兰冰盖、南极冰盖和全球山地冰川物质亏损加剧;多年冻土温度升高、活动层增厚,海底多年冻土范围减少;北半球积雪范围也在明显变小,但积雪量有较大空间差异。冰冻圈的快速萎缩加速海平面的上升。未来人类活动对冰冻圈萎缩的影响将愈加显著,从而导致北极海冰面积继续减少乃至消失,冰盖和冰川物质将持续亏损,多年冻土和积雪的范围继续缩减。报告也提出,目前冰冻圈研究仍存在观测资料稀缺、模型对各影响因素的敏感性参数和过程描述亟需提升、对吸光性杂质的变化机制认知不足等问题,从而影响了对冰冻圈变化预估的准确性,未来需要重点关注。  相似文献   

13.
The Working Group I report of the Sixth Assessment Report（AR6）of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change（IPCC）was released in August 2021. Base on updated and expanding data, AR6 presented the improved assessment of past changes and processes of cryosphere. AR6 also predicted the future changes us⁃ ing the models in CMIP6. The components of cryosphere were rapid shrinking under climate warming in the last decade. There were decreasing trends in Arctic sea-ice area and thickness. Sea-ice loss was significant. The Greenland Ice Sheet, the Antarctic Ice Sheet and all glaciers lost more mass than in any other decade. Global warming over the last decades had led to widespread permafrost warming, active layer thickness increasing and subsea permafrost extent reducing. Snow cover extent in the Northern Hemisphere also decreased significantly. However, the variations of snow depth and snow water equivalent showed great spatial heterogeneity. The rapid shrinking of the cryosphere accelerated the global mean sea level rise. The impact of human activities on cryo⁃ sphere will become more significant in the future. The Arctic sea-ice area will decrease, and the Arctic Ocean will likely become practically sea ice-free. The Greenland Ice Sheet, the Antarctic Ice Sheet and glaciers will continue to lose mass throughout this century. Permafrost and Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent will con⁃ tinue to decrease as global climate continues to warm. In addition, there are still uncertainties in the prediction of cryosphere due to the absence of observations, the poor sensitivity of models to the components and processes of cryosphere, and the inexplicit represent of the mechanism of light-absorbing impurities. More attentions should be paid on these issues in the future. © 2022 Science Press (China). All rights reserved.  相似文献   

14.
Relative sea level at Vancouver, British Columbia rose from below the present datum about 30,000 cal yr B.P. to at least 18 m above sea level 28,000 cal yr B.P. In contrast, eustatic sea level in this interval was at least 85 m lower than at present. The difference in the local and eustatic sea-level positions is attributed to glacio-isostatic depression of the crust in the expanding forefield of the Cordilleran ice sheet during the initial phase of the Fraser Glaciation. Our findings suggest that about 1 km of ice was present in the northern Strait of Georgia 28,000 cal yr B.P., early during the Fraser Glaciation.  相似文献   

15.
Fundamental characteristics of the climate system during the most recent precessional cycle of the Earth's orbit around the Sun consist of the final expansion of land ice to its maximum extent, the subsequent episode of deglaciation, and the variations of global sea level that accompanied these events. In order to address the important issue of the variation of continental ice volume and related changes in global sea level through the late glacial period, we employ an extended set of observations of the pre-glacial and postglacial history of sea-level rise at the island of Barbados, together with a refined model of continental deglaciation and an accurate methodology for the prediction of postglacial sea-level change. Although our results provide unambiguous evidence that the post LGM rise of eustatic sea-level was very close to the widely supported estimate of 120 m, the data also provide evidence that LGM must have occurred 26,000 years ago, approximately 5000 yr earlier than the usually assumed age.  相似文献   

16.
Sediment successions from the Kanin Peninsula and Chyoshskaya Bay in northwestern Russia contain information on the marginal behaviour of all major ice sheets centred in Scandinavia, the Barents Sea and the Kara Sea during the Eemian-Weichselian. Extensive luminescence dating of regional lithostratigraphical units, supported by biostratigraphical evidence, identifies four major ice advances at 100-90, 70-65, 55-45 and 20-18 kyr ago interbedded with lacustrine, glaciolacustrine and marine sediments. The widespread occurrence of marine tidal sediments deposited c. 65-60 kyr ago allows a stratigraphical division of the Middle Weichselian Barents Sea and Kara Sea ice sheets into two shelf-based glaciations separated by almost complete deglaciation. The first ice dispersal centre was in the Barents Sea and thereafter in the Kara Sea. It is possible to extract both flow patterns from ice marginal landforms inside the southward termination. Accordingly, it is proposed that the Markhida line and its western continuation are asynchronous and originate from two separate glaciations before and after the marine transgression. The marine sedimentation occurred during a eustatic sea-level rise of up to 20 m/1000 yr, i.e. the Mezen Transgression. We speculate that the rapid eustatic sea-level rise triggered a collapse of the Barents Sea Ice Sheet at the MIS (Marine Isotope Stage) 4 to 3 transition. This is motivated by lack of an early marine highstand, the timing of events, and the marginal position of Arkhangelsk relative to open marine conditions.  相似文献   

17.
《Quaternary Science Reviews》2007,26(17-18):2113-2127
We compare numerical predictions of glaciation-induced sea-level change to data from 8 locations around the Antarctic coast in order to test if the available data preclude the possibility of a dominant Antarctic contribution to meltwater pulse IA (mwp-IA). Results based on a subset of 7 spherically symmetric earth viscosity models and 6 different Antarctic deglaciation histories indicate that the sea-level data do not rule out a large Antarctic source for this event. Our preliminary analysis indicates that the Weddell Sea is the most likely source region for a large (∼9 m) Antarctic contribution to mwp-IA. The Ross Sea is also plausible as a significant contributor (∼5 m) from a sea-level perspective, but glacio-geological field observations are not compatible with such a large and rapid melt from this region. Our results suggest that the Lambert Glacier component of the East Antarctic ice sheet experienced significant retreat at the time of mwp-IA, but only contributed ∼0.15 m (eustatic sea-level change). All of the ice models considered under-predicted the isostatic component of the sea-level response in the Antarctic Peninsula and the Sôya Coast region of the East Antarctic ice sheet, indicating that the maximum ice thickness in these regions is underestimated. It is therefore plausible that ice melt from these areas, the Antarctic Peninsula in particular, could have made a significant contribution to mwp-IA.  相似文献   

18.
The Greenland and East and West Antarctic ice sheets are assessed as being the source of ice that produced an Eemian sea level 6 m higher than present sea level. The most probable source is total collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet accompanied by partial collapse of the adjacent sector of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet in direct contact with the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. This conclusion is reached by applying a simple formula relating the “floating fraction” of ice along flowlines to ice height above the bed. Increasing the floating fraction lowered ice elevations enough to contribute up to 4.7 m to global sea level. Adding 3.3 m resulting from total collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet accounts for the higher Eemian sea level. Partial gravitational collapse that produced the present ice drainage system of Amery Ice Shelf contributes 2.3 m to global sea level. These results cast doubt on the presumed stability of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, but destabilizing mechanisms remain largely unknown. Possibilities include glacial surges and marine instabilities at the respective head and foot of ice streams.  相似文献   

19.
新一代冰流模式乌阿及其在南极埃默里冰架的应用   总被引：1，自引：1，他引：0  
李腾  陈卓奇  李慧林  程晓  韦屹  刘岩 《冰川冻土》2020,42(1):254-264
南极冰盖不仅是全球环境变化的指示器, 其消融所产生成的淡水输入也是未来海平面上升的主要不确定性来源。数值模式是诊断冰流动力机制、 评估冰盖物质损耗的重要手段。本文首先介绍了乌阿（冰岛语úa或英语Ua）冰流模式的基本原理, 并利用该模式模拟东南极埃默里冰架的动态变化。乌阿冰流模式基于质量和动量守恒方程的垂直积分, 在自适应不规则三角网格上求解微分方程, 仅用少数参数规则即可构造适应冰流动力特征的网格结构, 有效缩减运算时间。采用当前主流的模式边界数据集, 针对埃默里冰架设计了两个试验。试验一为反演试验, 试验中模式的代价函数在100次迭代后下降三个数量级, 表明模拟的流速与遥感观测吻合（RMSE = 13.35 m·a-1）, 但高频细节仍有待提高; 试验二为预测试验, 测试了模拟冰厚变化率的不确定性, 以自由漂移量接近零为标准选出一组最优模型参数, 最后假设埃默里冰架解体情景开展模拟, 结果表明冰架解体会导致海平面上升（45.36 ± 0.08） mm。随着资料更新迭代, 基于最新发布的南极底部地形数据模拟效果是否提升还有待未来检验。  相似文献   

20.
Stratigraphic studies of pollen and macrofossils from six sites at different elevations in the White Mountains of New Hampshire demonstrate changes in the distributions of four coniferous tree species during the Holocene. Two species presently confined to low elevations extended farther up the mountain slopes during the early Holocene: white pine grew 350 m above its present limit beginning 9000 yr B.P., while hemlock grew 300–400 m above its present limit soon after the species immigrated to the region 7000 yr. B.P. Hemlock disappeared from the highest sites about 5000 yr B.P., but both species persisted at sites 50–350 m above their present limits until the Little Ice Age began a few centuries ago. The history of the two main high-elevation conifers is more difficult to interpret. Spruce and fir first occur near their present upper limits 9000 or 10,000 yr B.P. Fir persisted in abundance at elevations similar to those where it occurs today throughout the Holocene, while spruce became infrequent at all elevations from the beginning of the Holocene until 2000 yr B.P. These facts suggest a more complex series of changes than a mere upward shift of the modern environmental gradient. Nevertheless, we conclude that the minimum climatic change which would explain the upward extensions of hemlock and white pine is a rise in temperature, perhaps as much as 2°C. The interval of maximum warmth started 9000 yr B.P. and lasted at least until 5000 yr B.P., correlative with the Prairie Period in Minnesota.  相似文献   

设为首页 | 免责声明 | 关于勤云 | 加入收藏

Copyright©北京勤云科技发展有限公司  京ICP备09084417号