Spatial scale in the pollen record

Abstract

Pollen is liberally distributed across the landscape, and is preserved in a variety of different types of site. Pollen analysts frequently have a choice of deposits to sample, and will never examine all the fossil pollen at any site. Pollen data can be used to sense past and present vegetation at a range of spatial scales. Huntley and Birks produced contoured distribution maps of pollen from the last 13,000 years, and were careful to select sites that had been sampled and analysed in a relatively uniform manner. Counting fossil pollen senses vegetation in an indirect fashion. The noise' in the pollen data at the regional spatial scale resolved into the signal' at the local scale. Our studies of contemporary pollen-vegetation relationships have revealed the schizophrenic nature of regional pollen data. All transport is aerial, and there is minimal horizontal or vertical mixing of pollen after deposition.

Published in

Title: Modelling Ecological Change : Perspectives from Neoecology, Palaeoecology and Environmental Archaeology
Publisher: Taylor and Francis

SLU Authors

• Bradshaw, Richard

  • Department of Landscape Planning Alnarp, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Ecology

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315424491-5
• ISBN: 9781138404984

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/130382