Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T22:26:25.625Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Late Holocene Vegetation and Climate Oscillations in the Qaidam Basin of the Northeastern Tibetan Plateau

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Yan Zhao ,
Zicheng Yu ,
Xiuju Liu ,
Cheng Zhao ,
Fahu Chen  and
Ke Zhang
Yan Zhao*
Affiliation:
MOE Key Laboratory of Western China's Environmental System, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
Zicheng Yu
Affiliation:
MOE Key Laboratory of Western China's Environmental System, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lehigh University, 31 Williams Drive, Bethlehem, PA 18015, USA
Xiuju Liu
Affiliation:
Large Lakes Observatory, University of Minnesota, 2205 East 5th Street, Duluth, MN 55812, USA
Cheng Zhao
Affiliation:
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lehigh University, 31 Williams Drive, Bethlehem, PA 18015, USA
Fahu Chen
Affiliation:
MOE Key Laboratory of Western China's Environmental System, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
Ke Zhang
Affiliation:
MOE Key Laboratory of Western China's Environmental System, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
*
*Corresponding author. Fax: +1 86 931 891 2330.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Pollen evidence from sediment cores at Hurleg and Toson lakes in the Qaidam Basin was obtained to examine vegetation and climatic change in the northeastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. The chronologies were controlled by 210Pb and 137Cs analysis and AMS 14C dating. Pollen assemblages from both lakes are dominated by Chenopodiaceae (∼ 40%), Artemisia (∼ 30–35%) and Poaceae (∼ 20–25%), with continued occurrence but low abundance of Nitraria, Ephedra, and Cyperaceae. Artemisia/Chenopodiaceae (A/C) pollen ratios from two lakes show coherent large oscillations at centennial timescale during the last 1000 yr. A/C ratios were high around AD 1170, 1270, 1450, 1700 and 1920, suggesting that the vegetation was more “steppe-like” under a relatively moist climate than that during the intervening periods. Wet-dry climate shifts at the two lakes (2800 m asl) are in opposite phases to precipitation changes derived from tree-ring records in the surrounding mountains (> 3700 m asl) and to pollen and snow accumulation records from Dunde ice core (5300 m asl), showing that a dry climate in the basin corresponds with a wet interval in the mountains, especially around AD 1600. This contrasting pattern implies that topography might have played an important role in mediating moisture changes at regional scale in this topographically complex region.

Keywords

Late HoloceneArtemisia/Chenopodiaceae pollen ratioFossil pollenClimate changeQaidam BasinTibetan Plateau
Type
Original Articles
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 73 , Issue 1 , January 2010 , pp. 59 - 69
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.)

References

Binford, M.W., (1990). Calculation and uncertainty analysis of 210Pb dates for PIRLA project lake sediment cores. Journal of Paleolimnology 3, 253–267.Google Scholar
Brantingham, P.J., Gao, X., Olsen, J.W., Ma, H.Z., Rhode, D., Zhang, H.Y., Madsen, D.B., (2007). A short chronology for the peopling of the Tibetan Plateau. Madsen, D., Chen, F.H., Gao, X. Late Quaternary Climate Change and Human Adaptation in Arid China. Developments in Quaternary Science. vol. 9, Elsevier, Amsterdam.129–151.Google Scholar
Broccoli, A.J., Manabe, S., (1992). The effects of orography on midlatitude Northern Hemisphere dry climates. Journal of Climate 5, 1181–1201.Google Scholar
Cohen, A.S., Palacios-Fest, M.R., Negrini, R.M., Wigand, P.E., Erbes, D.B., (2000). A paleoclimate record for the past 250,000" years from Summer Lake, Oregon, USA: П. Sedimentology, paleontology and geochemistry. Journal of Paleolimnology 24, 151–182.Google Scholar
Cour, P., Zheng, Z., Duzer, D., Calleja, M., Yao, Z., (1999). Vegetational and climatic significance of modern pollen rain in northwestern Tibet. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 104, 183–204.Google Scholar
Davis, C.P., Fall, P.L., (2001). Modern pollen precipitation from an elevational transect in central Jordan and its relationship to vegetation. Journal of Biogeography 28, 1195–1210.Google Scholar
Davis, M.E., Thompson, L.G., Yao, T.D., Wang, N.L., (2005). Forcing of the Asian monsoon on the Tibetan Plateau: evidence from high-resolution ice core and tropical coral records. Journal of Geophysical Research 110, D04101, 10.1029/2004DJ004933 Google Scholar
Dean, W.E., (1974). Determination of carbonate and organic matter in calcareous sediments and sedimentary rocks by loss on ignition: comparison with other methods. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 44, 242–248.Google Scholar
El-Moslimany, A.P., (1990). The ecological significance of common nonarboreal pollen: examples from dryland of the Middle East. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 64, 343–350.Google Scholar
Fægri, K., Iversen, J., (1989). Textbook of Pollen Analysis. 4th EditionJohn Wiley and Sons, London, UK.Google Scholar
Grimm, E.C., (1987). CONISS: a Fortran 77 program for stratigraphically constrained cluster analysis by the method of incremental sum of squares. Computers & Geosciences 13, 13–35.Google Scholar
Gunin, P.D., Vostokova, E.A., Dorofeyuk, N.I., Tarasov, P.E., Black, C.C., (1999). Vegetation Dynamics of Mongolia. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht.46–54.Google Scholar
He, H.Y., McGinnis, J.W., Song, Z.S., Yanai, M., (1987). Onset of the Asian summer monsoon in 1979 and the effect of the Tibetan Plateau. Monthly Weather Review 115, 1966–1995.Google Scholar
Herzschuh, U., (2007). Reliability of pollen ratios for environmental reconstructions on the Tibetan Plateau. Journal of Biogeography 34, 1265–1273.Google Scholar
Herzschuh, U., Hueschner, H., Ma, Y.Z., (2003). The surface pollen and relative pollen production of the desert vegetation of the Alashan Plateau, western Inner Mongolia. Chinese Science Bulletin 48, 1488–1493.Google Scholar
Jiang, W.Y., Guo, Z.T., Sun, X.J., Wu, H.B., Chu, G.Q., Yuan, B.Y., Hattée, C., Guiot, J., (2006). Reconstruction of climate and vegetation changes of Lake Bayanchagan (Inner Mongolia): Holocene variability of the East Asian monsoon. Quaternary Research 65, 411–420.Google Scholar
Li, Y.C., Xu, Q.H., Zhao, Y.K., Yang, X.L., Xiao, J.L., Chen, H., Lu, X.M., (2005). Pollen indication to source plants in the eastern desert of China. Chinese Science Bulletin 50, 1632–1641.Google Scholar
Liu, K.B., Yao, Z.J., Thompson, L., (1998). A pollen record of Holocene climatic changes from dunde ice cap, Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Geology 26, 135–138.Google Scholar
Liu, H.Y., Cui, H.T., Pott, R., Speier, M., (1999). The surface pollen of the woodland-steppe ecotone in southeastern Inner Mongolia, China. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 105, 237–250.Google Scholar
Maher, L.J., (1964). Ephedra pollen in sediments of the Great Lakes region. Ecology 45, 391–395.Google Scholar
Maher, L.J., (1981). Statistics for microfossil concentration measurements employing samples spiked with marker grains. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 32, 153–191.Google Scholar
Prat, N., Daroca, M.V., (1983). Eutrophication processes in Spanish reservoirs as revealed by biological records in profundal sediments. Hydrobiologia 103, 153–158.Google Scholar
Reimer, P.J., Baillie, M.G.L., Bard, E., Bayliss, A., Beck, J.W., Bertrand, C.J.H., Blackwell, P.G., Buck, C.E., Burr, G.S., Cutler, K.B., Damon, P.E., Edwards, R.L., Fairbanks, R.G., Friedrich, M., Guilderson, T.P., Hogg, A.G., Hughen, K.A., Kromer, B., McCormac, F.G., Manning, S.W., Ramsey, C.B., Reimer, R.W., Remmele, S., Southon, J.R., Stuiver, M., Talamo, S., Taylor, F.W., van der Plicht, J., Weyhenmeyer, C.E., (2004). Intcal04 terrestrial radiocarbon age calibration, 0–26" cal kyr BP. Radiocarbon 46, 1029–1058.Google Scholar
Sato, T., Kimura, F., (2005). Impact of diabatic heating over the Tibetan Plateau on subsidence over northern Asian arid region. Geophysical Research Letters 32, L05809, 10.1029/2004GL022089 Google Scholar
Shao, X.M., Liang, E.Y., Huang, L., Wang, L.L., (2005). A 1437-year precipitation history from Qilian juniper in the northeastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. PAGES News 13, 2, 14–15.Google Scholar
Shen, J., Liu, X.Q., Wang, S.M., Mastsumoto, R., (2005). Palaeoclimatic changes in the Qinghai Lake area during the last 18,000" years. Quaternary International 136, 131–140.Google Scholar
Shen, C.M., Liu, K., Tang, L.Y., Overpeck, J.T., (2006). Quantitative relationships between modern pollen rain and climate in the Tibetan Plateau. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 140, 61–77.Google Scholar
Sheppard, P.R., Tarasov, P.E., Graumlich, L.J., Heussner, K.-U., Wagner, M., Oesterle, H., Thompson, L.G., (2004). Annual precipitation since 515 BC reconstructed from living and fossil juniper growth of northeastern Qinghai Province, China. Climate Dynamics 23, 869–881.Google Scholar
Sugita, S., (1994). Pollen representation of vegetation in Quaternary sediments: theory and method in patchy vegetation. Journal of Ecology 82, 881–897.Google Scholar
Tarasov, P.E., Jolly, D., Kaplan, J.O., (1997). A continuous late glacial and Holocene record of vegetation changes in Kazakhstan. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 136, 281–292.Google Scholar
Tell, G., del Zamaloa, M.C., (2004). A Miocene algal assemblage dominated by Pediastrum leonensis n. sp. (Chlorophyceae) from Patagonia, Argentina: paleoenvironmental implications. Journal of Paleolimnology 32, 247–254.Google Scholar
Thompson, L.G., Thompson, E.M., Davis, M.E., Lin, P.N., Yao, T., Dyurgerov, M., Dai, J., (1993). “Recent warming”: ice core evidence from tropical ice cores with emphasis on Central Asia. Global and Planetary Change 7, 145–156.Google Scholar
Thompson, L.G., Thompson, E.M., Davis, M.E., Lin, P.N., Henderson, K., Mashiotta, T.A., (2003). Tropical glacier and ice core evidence of climate change on annual to millennial time scales. Climatic Change 59, 137–155.Google Scholar
Van Campo, E., Cour, P., Hang, S.X., (1996). Holocene environmental changes in Bangong Co basin (Western Tibet). Part 2: the pollen record. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 120, 49–63.Google Scholar
Wang, S.M., Dou, H.S., (1998). Lakes in China. Science Press, Beijing. (in Chinese)Google Scholar
Wang, F.X., Qian, N.F., Zhang, Y.L., (1995). Pollen Flora of China. Science Press, Beijing. (in Chinese)Google Scholar
Yan, S., (1991). The characteristics of Quaternary sporo-pollen assemblage and the vegetation succession in Xinjiang. Arid Land Geography 14, 1–9. (in Chinese with English abstract)Google Scholar
Yao, T.D., Xie, Z.C., Yang, Q.Z., (1991). Temperature and precipitation fluctuations since 1600a provided by dunde ice cap, China. Presented in International Symposium on Glacial-Ocean-Atmosphere Interactions, International Association of Hydrological Sciences Publication 208, 61–70.Google Scholar
Yi, X.X., Yang, D.S., Xu, W.D., (1992). China Regional Hydrogeology Survey Report-Toson Lake Map (J-47-[25] 1:200,000). Qaidam Integrative Geological Survey, Golmud, Qinghai, China. 123 pages, plus tables, drill core lithology, and maps (in Chinese).Google Scholar
Yin, Z.Y., Shao, X.M., Qin, N.S., Liang, E.Y., (2008). Reconstruction of a 1436-year soil moisture and vegetation water use history based on tree-ring widths from Qilian junipers in northeastern Qaidam Basin, northwestern China. International Journal of Climatology 28, 37–53.Google Scholar
Yu, G., Tang, L.Y., Yang, X.D., Ke, X.K., Harrison, S.P., (2001). Modern pollen samples from alpine vegetation on the Tibetan Plateau. Global Ecology and Biogeography 10, 503–519.Google Scholar
Zhang, Q.B., Cheng, G.D., Yao, T.D., Kang, X.C., Huang, J.G., (2003). A 2,326-year tree-ring record of climate variability on the northeastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Geophysical Research Letters 30, 1439–1442.Google Scholar
Zhao, Y., Herzschuh, U., (2008). Surface pollen representation of source vegetation in the Qaidam Basin and the surrounding mountains, the northeastern Tibetan Plateau. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany, 10.1007/s00334-008-0201-7 Google Scholar
Zhao, Y., Yu, Z.C., Chen, F.H., Ito, E., Zhao, C., (2007). Holocene vegetation and climate history at Hurleg Lake in the Qaidam Basin, northwest China. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 145, 275–288.Google Scholar
Zhao, Y., Yu, Z.C., Chen, F.H., Liu, X.J., Ito, E., (2008). Sensitive response of desert vegetation to moisture change based on annually-resolved pollen record from Gahai Lake in the Qaidam Basin, northwest China. Global and Planetary Change 62, 107–114.Google Scholar
Zhou, L.H., Sun, S.Z., Chen, G.C., (1990). Vegetation Map of Qinghai Province (1:1,000,000). China Science and Technology Press, Beijing.23–24. (in Chinese)Google Scholar