Abstract
Palaeolimnological studies should ideally be based upon continuous, undisturbed sediment sequences with reliable chronologies. However for some lake cores, these conditions are not met and palaeolimnologists are often faced with dating puzzles caused by sediment disturbances in the past. This study chooses Esthwaite Water from England to illustrate how to identify sedimentation discontinuities in lake cores and how chronologies can be established for imperfect cores by correlation of key sediment signatures in parallel core records and with long-term monitoring data (1945–2003). Replicated short cores (ESTH1, ESTH7, and ESTH8) were collected and subjected to loss-on-ignition, radiometric dating (210Pb, 137Cs, and 14C), particle size, trace metal, and fossil diatom analysis. Both a slumping and a hiatus event were detected in ESTH7 based on comparisons made between the cores and the long-term diatom data. Ordination analysis suggested that the slumped material in ESTH7 originated from sediment deposited around 1805–1880 AD. Further, it was inferred that the hiatus resulted in a loss of sediment deposited from 1870 to 1970 AD. Given the existence of three superior 14C dates in ESTH7, ESTH1 and ESTH7 were temporally correlated by multiple palaeolimnological proxies for age-depth model development. High variability in sedimentation rates was evident, but good agreement across the various palaeolimnological proxies indicated coherence in sediment processes within the coring area. Differences in sedimentation rates most likely resulted from the natural morphology of the lake basin. Our study suggests that caution is required in selecting suitable coring sites for palaeolimnological studies of small, relatively deep lakes and that proximity to steep slopes should be avoided wherever possible. Nevertheless, in some cases, comparisons between a range of contemporary and palaeolimnological records can be employed to diagnose sediment disturbances and establish a chronology.
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Dr. Xuhui Dong received his Bachelor’s degree in applied geophysics from the Jilin University, Changchun, China in 2002 and his Master’s degree in geography from the Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGLAS) in 2005. In 2010, he obtained his PhD degree in Environmental Change Research Center, University College London (UCL). Subsequently, he joined NIGLAS, where he became an associate professor in January 2013. His main scientific interests combine contemporary and paleo-limnology to understand environmental changes in aquatic ecosystems across a variety of spatiotemporal scales (i.e., annual to millennial) using biological remains such as diatoms, cladoceras, and chironomids in lake sediments.
Dr. Carl Sayer received his Bachelor and PhD degree from Loughborough University, UK in 1993 and 1997, respectively. He is a senior lecturer at UCL with research focusing on the application of freshwater ecology and palaeoecological science to conservation management and restoration. He is especially interested in shallow lake, pond, and lowland river environments and in aquatic macrophytes, algae, and fishes, including their fossil counterparts. Carl’s recent work has focused on landscape-scale biodiversity conservation in farmland and in particular the role of pond restoration. He is a regular advisor to the UK conservation agencies regarding freshwater conservation and has published 70 scientific papers and book chapters, as well as a great many popular natural history articles in magazines and blogs.
Dr. Helen Bennion obtained her Bachelor and PhD degree in Environmental Change at UCL, in 1988 and in 1993 respectively. She is currently a Reader in Environmental Change at UCL. She has over 20 years experience with aquatic ecological research into the structure and functioning of lakes, particularly shallow, lowland systems subject to eutrophication. Her work has been largely concerned with developing methods for assessing lake ecological response to nutrient enrichment over a range of timescales involving diatoms and aquatic macrophytes. She works closely with government agencies and conservation organisations to help inform lake management and conservation strategies especially with regard to establishing restoration targets. She has published 60 academic articles and over 70 research reports.
Prof. Stephen Maberly received his first degree from Reading University in 1978 and his PhD from St Andrews University in 1981. He is a Senior Principal Scientist within the Lake Ecosystems Group at CEH Lancaster, a visiting professor at Queen Mary University of London, and a past Chinese Academy of Science visiting professor at Wuhan. He has worked on aquatic ecosystems for over 30 years, particularly in the English Lake District where he coordinates the long-term research there. Stephen has a particular interest in relating changing environmental conditions, particularly those driven by climate change and changing CO2 availability, to physiological and ecological responses through laboratory experiments, field measurements, and the analysis of long-term data. He has published 120 papers in refereed journals, co-written one book, and is the author of 80 reports on freshwater management. He was awarded the Luigi Provasoli Award from the American Phycological Society in 1992.
Dr. Handong Yang received his first degree fromWuhan University in 1984, his M.Sc. from Institute of Hydrobiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1992, and his PhD from UCL in 2000. He is a Senior Research Fellow in Environmental Change Research Centre at UCL. He has worked in China and the UK on freshwater lake ecosystems, with particular interest in lake metal pollution, sedimentation process, and sediment radiometric dating. His research has been mainly focused on lake pollution derived through atmospheric deposition, including: using Pb isotopes as indicators to identify Pb sources, trace metal budgets in lake ecosystems, trace metal (especially Hg and Pb) pollution history recorded by lake sediments in Europe, China, Uganda, and other regions, and their implications for metal cycling in the atmosphere. He has published 60 journal papers and book chapters.
Prof. Richard Battarbee is an Emeritus Professor and former Director of the Environmental Change Research Centre at UCL. He is a palaeolimnologist interested in the use of diatoms as indicators of lake ecosystem change with special reference to acidification, eutrophication, and salinisation. His recent work is concerned with the response of lakes to reductions in acid deposition and the potential role of climate change in modifying recovery processes. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society (UK) and a foreign member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters and has published over 200 research papers.
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Dong, X., Sayer, C.D., Bennion, H. et al. Identifying sediment discontinuities and solving dating puzzles using monitoring and palaeolimnological records. Front. Earth Sci. 10, 621–633 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11707-016-0578-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11707-016-0578-z