Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-19T04:47:09.107Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Late Holocene δ13C and pollen records of paleosalinity from tidal marshes in the San Francisco Bay estuary, California☆

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Frances Malamud-Roam  and
B. Lynn Ingram
Frances Malamud-Roam*
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
B. Lynn Ingram
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA Department of Earth and Planetary Science, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail address:[email protected](F. Malamud-Roam).
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Records of stable carbon isotopes (δ13C) are presented from cores collected from four San Francisco Bay marshes and used as a proxy for changes in estuary salinity. The δ13C value of organic marsh sediments are a reflection of the relative proportion of C3 vs. C4 plants occupying the surface, and can thus be used as a proxy for vegetation change on the marsh surface. The four marshes included in this study are located along a natural salinity gradient that exists in the San Francisco Bay, and records of vegetation change at all four sites can be used to infer changes in overall estuary paleosalinity. The δ13C values complement pollen data from the same marsh sites producing a paleoclimate record for the late Holocene period in the San Francisco Bay estuary. The data indicate that there have been periods of higher-than-average salinity in the Bay estuary (reduced fresh water inflow), including 1600–1300 cal yr B.P., 1000–800 cal yr B.P., 300–200 cal yr B.P., and ca. A.D. 1950 to the present. Periods of lower-than-average salinity (increased fresh water inflow) occurred before 2000 cal yr B.P., from 1300 to 1200 cal yr B.P. and ca. 150 cal yr B.P. to A.D. 1950. A comparison of the timing of these events with records from the California coast, watershed, and beyond the larger drainage of the Bay reveals that the paleosalinity variations reflected regional precipitation.

Keywords

Late Holoceneδ13CPollen recordsSan Francisco Bay estuary
Type
Research Article
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 62 , Issue 2 , September 2004 , pp. 134 - 145
Copyright
University of Washington

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

☆

A supplementary table entitled “Stable carbon isotopic compositions and calculated C4 fraction from four marsh sites in the San Francisco Bay estuary” is available in a data repository and may be found on (http://www.sciencedirect.com).

References

Atwater, B.F., (1982). UW-2078; U.S.G.S. Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-1401..Google Scholar
Atwater, B.F., Hedel, C.H., (1976). Distribution of seed plants with respect to tide levels and water salinity in the natural tidal marshes of the northern San Francisco Bay estuary, California. Open-File Report 76-389 U.S.G.S, Menlo Park, CA., 41 pp.Google Scholar
Atwater, B.F., Hedel, C.W., Helley, E.J., (1977). Late Quaternary depositional history, Holocene sea-level changes, and vertical crustal movement, southern San Francisco Bay, California. United States Geological Survey, Professional Paper 1014, (15 pp.).Google Scholar
Atwater, B.F., Conard, S.G., Dowden, J.N., Hedel, C.W., MacDonald, R.L., Savage, W., (1979). History, landforms, and vegetation of the Estuary's Tidal marshes. Conomos, T.J., San Francisco Bay: the Urbanized Estuary American Association for the Advancement of Science, Pacific Division, San Francisco., 347–385.Google Scholar
Byrne, R., Ingram, B.L., Starratt, S., Malamud-Roam, F., Collins, J.N., Conrad, M.E., (2001). Carbon-isotope, diatom and pollen evidence for late Holocene salinity change in a brackish marsh in the San Francisco Estuary. Quaternary Research 55, 66–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cayan, D.R., Peterson, D.H., (1989). The influence of North Pacific atmospheric circulation on streamflow in the west. Peterson, D.H., Aspects of Climate Variability in the Pacific and the Western Americas. Geophysical Monograph vol. 55, American Geophysical Union, Washington, D.C., 375–398.Google Scholar
Chmura, G.L., Aharon, P., (1995). Stable carbon isotope signatures of sedimentary carbon in coastal wetlands as indicators of salinity regime. Journal of Coastal Research 11, 1 124–135.Google Scholar
Chmura, G.L., Aharon, P., Socki, R.A., Abernathy, R., (1987). An inventory of 13C abundances in coastal wetlands of Louisiana, USA: vegetation and sediments. Oecologia (Berlin) 74, 264–271.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cole, K., Liu, G.W., (1994). Holocene paleoecology of an estuary on Santa Rosa Island, California. Quaternary Research 41, 326–335.Google Scholar
Craig, H., (1957). Isotopic standards for carbon and oxygen correction factors for mass-spectrometric analysis of carbon dioxide. Geochimica Cosmochimica Acta 12, 133–149.Google Scholar
Cuneo, K.L.C., (1987). San Francisco Bay salt marsh vegetation, geography and ecology: A baseline for use in impact assessment and restoration planning.. Ph.D. dissertation, U.C. Berkeley.Google Scholar
Davis, O.K., (1992). Rapid climatic change in coastal southern California inferred from pollen analysis of San Joaquin Marsh. Quaternary Research 37, 89–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Delaune, R.D., (1986). The use of δ13C signature of C3 and C4 plants in determining past depositional environments in rapidly accreting marshes of the Mississippi river deltaic plain, Louisiana, USA. Chemical Geology 59, 315–320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ember, L.M., Williams, D.F., Morris, J.T., (1987). Processes that influence carbon isotope variations in salt marsh sediments. Marine Ecology, Progress Series 36, 33–42.Google Scholar
Faegri, K., Iversen, J., (1989). Textbook of Pollen Analysis. 4th ed. Wiley, New York., 328 pp.Google Scholar
Fairbanks, R.G., (1989). A 17,000-year glacio-eustatic sea level record; influence of glacial melting rates on the Younger Dryas event and deep-ocean circulation. Nature 342, 637–642.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilbert, G.K., (1917). Hydraulic-Mining Débris in the Sierra Nevada. Professional Paper - United States Geological Survey 105, (Washington, DC).Google Scholar
Goman, M., (2001). Statistical analysis of modern seed assemblages from the San Francisco Bay: applications for the reconstruction of paleo-salinity and paleo-tidal inundation. Journal of Paleolimnology 24, 393–409.Google Scholar
Goman, M., Wells, L., (2000). Trends in river flow affecting the northeastern reach of the San Francisco Bay estuary over the past 7000 years. Quaternary Research 54, 2 206–217.Google Scholar
Graumlich, L., (1993). A 1000-year record of temperature and precipitation in the Sierra-Nevada. Quaternary Research 39, 2 249–255.Google Scholar
Ingram, B.L., (1998). Differences in radiocarbon age between shell and charcoal from a Holocene shellmound in northern California. Quaternary Research 49, 102–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingram, B.L., Depaolo, D.J., (1993). A 4300 year strontium isotope record of estuarine paleosalinity in San Francisco Bay, California. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 119, 103–119.Google Scholar
Ingram, B.L., Southon, J.R., (1996). Reservoir ages in Eastern Pacific coastal and estuarine waters. Radiocarbon 38, 573–582.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ingram, B.L., Ingle, J.C., Conrad, M.E., (1996a). A 2000 year record of Sacramento–San Joaquin River inflow to San Francisco Bay estuary, California. Geology 24, 331–334.Google Scholar
Ingram, B.L., Ingle, J.C., Conrad, M.E., (1996b). Stable isotope record of late Holocene salinity and river discharge in San Francisco Bay, California. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 141, 237–247.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Josselyn, M., (1983). The Ecology of San Francisco Bay Tidal Marshes: A Community Profile. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Division of Biological Services, Washington, DC.FWS/OBS Report 83/82, 102 pp.Google Scholar
Kennett, D.J., Ingram, B.L., Erlandson, J.M., (1997). Evidence for temporal fluctuations in marine radiocarbon reservoir ages in the Santa Barbara Channel, Southern California. Journal of Archaeological Science 24, 1051–1059.Google Scholar
Knowles, N., (2000). Modeling the Hydroclimate of the San Francisco Bay-Delta estuary and Watershed.. PhD Thesis, University of California, San Diego., 291 pp.Google Scholar
Mahall, B.E., Park, R.B., (1976a). The ecotone between Spartina foliosa and Salicornia virginica in salt marshes in Northern San Francisco Bay: 1 Biomass and production. Journal of Ecology 64, 421–433.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mahall, B.E., Park, R.B., (1976b). The ecotone between Spartina foliosa and Salicornia virginica in salt marshes in Northern San Francisco Bay: 2. Soil water and salinity. Journal of Ecology 64, 793–809.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mahall, B.E., Park, R.B., (1976c). The ecotone between Spartina foliosa and Salicornia virginica in salt marshes in Northern San Francisco Bay: 3. Soil aeration and tidal immersion. Journal of Ecology 64, 811–819.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malamud-Roam, F., Ingram, L., (2001). Carbon isotopic compositions of plants and sediments of tide marshes in the San Francisco Estuary. Journal of Coastal Research 17, 1 17–19.Google Scholar
Mall, R.E., (1969). Soil water relationships of waterfowl food plants in the Suisun marsh of California. Wildlife Bulletin # 1 California Department of Fish and Game, Sacramento, CA.Google Scholar
May, , Michael, D., (1999). Vegetation and salinity changes over the last 2000 years at two islands in the northern San Francisco Estuary, California.. MA Thesis., U.C. Berkeley., 55 pp.Google Scholar
Meko, D.M., Touchan, R., Hughes, M.K., Caprio, A.C., (2003). San Joaquin River flow reconstructed from tree rings.. In: West, G.J., Blomquist, N.L., (Eds.), Proceedings of the Nineteenth Annual Pacific Climate (PACLIM) Workshop, Pacific Grove, 3–6 March 2002, Sacramento: California Department of Water Resources, Integracy Ecological Program for the San Francisco Estuary, Technical Report 71, 186.Google Scholar
Mitch, W.J., Gosselink, J.G., (1993). Wetlands. 2nd ed. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York., 722 pp.Google Scholar
Nichols, F.H., Cloern, J.E., Luoma, S.N., Peterson, D.H., (1986). The modification of an estuary. Science 231, 567–573.Google Scholar
O'Leary, M.H., (1981). Carbon isotope fractionation in plants. Phytochemistry 20, 553–567.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O'Leary, M.H., Madhavan, S., Paneth, P., (1992). Physical and chemical basis of carbon isotope fractionation in plants. Plant Cell and Environment 15, 1099–1104.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peterson, D.H., Cayan, D.R., Festa, J.F., Nichols, F.H., Walters, R.A., Slack, J.V., Hager, S.E., Schemel, L.E., (1989). Climate variability in an estuary: effects of riverflow on San Francisco Bay. Peterson, D.H., Aspects of Climate Variability in the Pacific and the Western Americas. Geophysical Monograph vol. 55, American Geophysical Union, .Google Scholar
Peterson, D.H., Cayan, D.R., DiLeo, J., Noble, M., Dettinger, M., (1995). The role of climate in estuarine variability. The American Scientist 83, 58–67.Google Scholar
Stine, S., (1990). Late Holocene Fluctuations of Mono Lake, Eastern California. Paleogeography, Paleoclimatology, and Paleoecology 78, 333–381.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stine, S., (1994). Extreme and persistent drought in California and Patagonia during mediaeval time. Nature 369, 546–549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stuiver, M., Braziunus, T., (1993). Modelling atmospheric 14C influences and 14C ages of Marine Samples to 10,000 B.C. Radiocarbon 35, 215–230.Google Scholar
Stuiver, M., Reimer, P.J., Bard, E., Beck, J., Burr, G.S., Hughen, K.A., Kromer, B., McCormac, G., Van der Plicht, J., Spurk, M., (1998). INTCAL98 radiocarbon age calibration, 24,000–0 cal BP. Radiocarbon 40, 3 1041–1083.Google Scholar
United States Department Agriculture, NRCS, , (2002). The PLANTS Database, Version 3.5. National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, LA 70874-4490 USA.http://plants.usda.gov.Google Scholar
United States Geological Survey website, 2003. (2003). Water quality of San Francisco Bay: A Long-term Program of the U.S. Geological Survey.. http://sfbay.wr.usgs.gov/access/wqdata.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Malamud-Roam and Ingram Supplementary Material

Supplementary Material

Download Malamud-Roam and Ingram Supplementary Material(File)
File 30.1 KB