Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine
Identifying refugia— specifically places where species can persist during periods of regionally unsuitable climate— is increasingly important for conservation practitioners and land managers charged with protecting biodiversity in a rapidly warming world. Currently, many researchers assist in this p...
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| Format: | Article |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2023-02-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution |
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| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2023.1008594/full |
| _version_ | 1797902078232756224 |
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| author | Cas F. Carroll Jacquelyn L. Gill Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie |
| author_facet | Cas F. Carroll Jacquelyn L. Gill Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie |
| author_sort | Cas F. Carroll |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Identifying refugia— specifically places where species can persist during periods of regionally unsuitable climate— is increasingly important for conservation practitioners and land managers charged with protecting biodiversity in a rapidly warming world. Currently, many researchers assist in this process by building models to predict areas of refugia using climate data projected into the future under different climate scenarios; however, the coarse spatial scale of future climate data can be orders of magnitude larger than the scale of refugia on the landscape. Conservation paleobiology is an emerging field that can contribute to the identification of climate refugia by looking at the macrofossil records contained in sediments to better understand the response of species to past climate change within a small area, and allows us to ground-truth hypotheses about specific areas functioning as climate refugia. Here, we present a conservation paleobiology case study to update vulnerability assessments for subalpine plant species in Acadia National Park and locate potential future refugia on the landscape. We analyzed plant macrofossils in a sediment core from Sargent Mountain Pond in Acadia National Park (Maine, United States) at a fine spatiotemporal resolution to test the hypothesis that the area served as a past climate refugium for the subalpine species it currently hosts. We found that, when compared to a pollen record from a forest hollow core collected on Mount Desert Island, the macrofossils reflect a more stable presence of subalpine taxa throughout the Holocene Climatic Optimum (8,000–5,000 BP) than was observed at lower elevations. Our results indicate the importance of a complementary approach that combines plant macrofossils and pollen in addition to modeling to identify refugia and better understand the vulnerability of species and communities to climate change. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-10T09:12:07Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-60eec8afe1834610968c33a291c18c45 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2296-701X |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-10T09:12:07Z |
| publishDate | 2023-02-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution |
| spelling | doaj.art-60eec8afe1834610968c33a291c18c452023-02-21T04:42:48ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution2296-701X2023-02-011110.3389/fevo.2023.10085941008594Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, MaineCas F. Carroll0Jacquelyn L. Gill1Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie2Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie3Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation Biology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United StatesClimate Change Institute, University of Maine, Orono, ME, United StatesClimate Change Institute, University of Maine, Orono, ME, United StatesColby College, Waterville, ME, United StatesIdentifying refugia— specifically places where species can persist during periods of regionally unsuitable climate— is increasingly important for conservation practitioners and land managers charged with protecting biodiversity in a rapidly warming world. Currently, many researchers assist in this process by building models to predict areas of refugia using climate data projected into the future under different climate scenarios; however, the coarse spatial scale of future climate data can be orders of magnitude larger than the scale of refugia on the landscape. Conservation paleobiology is an emerging field that can contribute to the identification of climate refugia by looking at the macrofossil records contained in sediments to better understand the response of species to past climate change within a small area, and allows us to ground-truth hypotheses about specific areas functioning as climate refugia. Here, we present a conservation paleobiology case study to update vulnerability assessments for subalpine plant species in Acadia National Park and locate potential future refugia on the landscape. We analyzed plant macrofossils in a sediment core from Sargent Mountain Pond in Acadia National Park (Maine, United States) at a fine spatiotemporal resolution to test the hypothesis that the area served as a past climate refugium for the subalpine species it currently hosts. We found that, when compared to a pollen record from a forest hollow core collected on Mount Desert Island, the macrofossils reflect a more stable presence of subalpine taxa throughout the Holocene Climatic Optimum (8,000–5,000 BP) than was observed at lower elevations. Our results indicate the importance of a complementary approach that combines plant macrofossils and pollen in addition to modeling to identify refugia and better understand the vulnerability of species and communities to climate change.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2023.1008594/fullmacrofossilsconservation paleobiologysubalpinerefugiaclimate change vulnerability assessment |
| spellingShingle | Cas F. Carroll Jacquelyn L. Gill Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie Caitlin McDonough MacKenzie Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution macrofossils conservation paleobiology subalpine refugia climate change vulnerability assessment |
| title | Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine |
| title_full | Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine |
| title_fullStr | Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine |
| title_full_unstemmed | Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine |
| title_short | Early Holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in Acadia National Park, Maine |
| title_sort | early holocene plant macrofossils indicate cool refugia for subalpine plant taxa in acadia national park maine |
| topic | macrofossils conservation paleobiology subalpine refugia climate change vulnerability assessment |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2023.1008594/full |
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