Quaternary environmental and climatic reconstructions using subfossil insects from northern Norway ...

• Main Author: Young, Aythya Lena
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: The University of Edinburgh 2023
• Subjects: subfossil insects; Norway; northern Norway; past environmental conditions; past climatic conditions; future change; conservation; Arctic; current change; lake Øvre Æråsvatnet; Andøya; Vesterålen archipelago; non-biting midges; insects; Beetles; Vesterålen; Øvre; øvre Æråsvatnet; Northern Norway
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.7488/era/3278; https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/40512

Reconstructing past environmental and climatic conditions allows us to better understand the impact of change on the environment, along with the taxa that inhabit it. This can help with constraining our predictions for future change and focus conservation efforts. As contemporary change is being experienced at an unprecedented rate within the Arctic, investigating past change within this region is of utmost importance. Northern Norway is known to have experienced significant environmental change throughout the Quaternary, alternating between being covered in ice and being ice-free, multiple times. The traditional view that temperate taxa survived periods of glaciation further south, in refugia, is brought into question by the discovery that survival in crypto-refugia on ice-free islands, such as Andøya, was possible. Little work has been undertaken to analyse these Quaternary climatic and environmental changes within northern Norway, despite the effectiveness of insects, especially beetles and chironomids, ...