![]() ![]() ![]() To unlock information about long-term fire dynamics, preservation of particulate charcoal must occur in depositional environments, for example, in lakes and wetlands. Using charcoal and other environmental proxy records to provide information on interactions between fire, hydrology, and vegetation is also critical in sensitive ecosystems. For example, climate variations tend to affect vegetation distribution and composition which ultimately alters fire and fuel dynamics across the landscape. Knowledge of past fire regimes can also provide insights into past environmental conditions, such as periods of variability and change in climate (e.g., El Niño Southern Oscillation), hydrology and ecology. Developing palaeofire records allows modern fires to be placed in a long-term context, allowing fire management plans to be developed and adjusted accordingly. BG was supported by an Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering (AINSE) honours scholarship.Ĭompeting interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.įire is a significant disturbance agent in the landscape, with impacts on terrestrial flora and fauna, soil and landscape stability, biogeochemical cycles, and human society. Stable isotope analysis was supported by an Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) research portal grant to TR and BG (11017). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.ĭata Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.įunding: This research was funded by Macquarie University and the New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) through the Macquarie Marshes Fire History Project (S16019). Received: OctoAccepted: OctoPublished: October 24, 2019Ĭopyright: © 2019 Graves et al. PLoS ONE 14(10):Įditor: Eleonora Regattieri, University of Pisa, ITALY (2019) Macro-charcoal accumulation in floodplain wetlands: Problems and prospects for reconstruction of fire regimes and environmental conditions. High-resolution, multifaceted approaches with reliable geochronologies are required to assess spatial and temporal patterns of fire and to reconstruct in order to interpret wetland fire regimes.Ĭitation: Graves BP, Ralph TJ, Hesse PP, Westaway KE, Kobayashi T, Gadd PS, et al. Recognition of complex fire-climate-hydrology-vegetation interactions is essential. Major problems facing fire history reconstruction using macro-charcoal records in these wetlands include: (1) spatial and temporal variations in fire activity and ash and charcoal products within the wetlands, (2) variations in allochthonous inputs of charcoal from upstream sources, (3) tendency for geomorphic dynamism to affect flow dispersal and sediment and charcoal accumulation, and (4) propensity for post-depositional modification and/or destruction of macro-charcoal by flooding and taphonomic processes. Application of macro-charcoal and other environmental proxy techniques is inherently difficult in large, dynamic wetland systems due to variations in charcoal sources, sediment and charcoal deposition rates, and taphonomic processes. Sedimentology, geochemistry, and carbon stable isotopes (δ 13C range -15 to -25 ‰) were similar in all cores from both wetlands and varied little with depth. A positive correlation existed between the number of recent fires, satellite-observed ignition points, and macro-charcoal concentrations at the surface of the wetlands. cm -3, mean accumulation rates from 0 to 3.86 no. cm -2 a -1), autochthonous macro-charcoal in ~1 m deep sediment profiles spanning ~1.7 ka were highly variable and inconsistent between cores and wetlands (concentrations from 0 to 438 no. After accounting for fluvial macro-charcoal flux (1.05 ± 0.32 no. We employed a combined geomorphological and environmental proxy approach to assess allochthonous and autochthonous macro-charcoal accumulation in the Macquarie Marshes, Australia, with implications for the reconstruction of fire regimes and environmental conditions in large, open-system wetlands. Floodplain wetland ecosystems respond dynamically to flooding, fire and geomorphological processes. ![]()
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