Quaternary environmental and climatic reconstructions using subfossil insects from northern Norway
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 exp...
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| Other Authors: | , , , , |
| Format: | Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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The University of Edinburgh
2023
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1842/40512 https://doi.org/10.7488/era/3278 |
| Summary: | 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, in reconstructing past environmental and climatic conditions, having been well demonstrated. Thus, the overall aim of this thesis is to use subfossil insects to reconstruct the environment and climate of northern Norway throughout the Late Quaternary (last 24,000 years), whilst testing their robustness as proxies within the region. In doing so, this study provides the longest high-resolution chironomid study, the earliest, and most complete, Holocene reconstructions using beetles in northern Norway, as well as the first multi-proxy insect study in the region. Chironomids have been investigated between 24.0 and 8.2 cal ka BP from Øvre Æråsvatnet (Andøya), and quantitative July temperature reconstructions have been made. Beetles were recovered from Ramså (Andøya) from 11.0 to 8.2 cal ka BP and the Hollabåttjønnen Bog (Tønsnes) from 4.3 to 0.7 cal ka BP cal ka BP, and environmental and climatic reconstructions were made from both, based on their modern environmental and climatic preferences. These reconstructions ... |
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