Long Plio-Pleistocene Terrestrial Record of Climate Change and Mammal Turnover in Southern Spain

2001 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 411-418 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordi Agustı́ ◽  
Oriol Oms ◽  
Eduard Remacha
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Northern Hemisphere ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Southern Spain ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Dry Period ◽  
Late Pliocene ◽  
Southeastern Spain ◽  
The Mediterranean

AbstractCyclostratigraphic analysis of the Pliocene Zújar section (Guadix-Baza Basin, southeastern Spain) has enabled the recognition of a number of climatically forced cycles reflecting alternating dry and wet periods. Peaks of aridity are recorded at ca. 3.95, 3.55, 3.2, 2.8, and 1.8 myr B.P. The first dry period at about 4.0 myr B.P. corresponds to the early Ruscinian Mammal age, while the second arid interval at about 3.6 myr B.P. corresponds to the establishment of the Mediterranean double seasonality. The significant mammal turnover between the late Ruscinian and early Villanyian stages is placed between chron 2An.2n and the very base of chron 2An.1n, coincident with the dry phase recognized at about 3.2 myr B.P. The fourth aridity maximum at 2.8 myr B.P. roughly coincides with the Equus event in western Europe and is probably related to the beginning of the glacial–interglacial dynamics in the Northern Hemisphere. Finally, the last dry peak at about 1.8 myr B.P. is probably related to the set of mammalian events characterizing the transition from the late Pliocene faunas to those of the early Pleistocene.

scholarly journals Millennial-scale climate change and oceanic processes in the Late Pliocene and Early Pleistocene

2001 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 535-543 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katherine Mc Intyre ◽  
Margaret L. Delaney ◽  
A. Christina Ravelo
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Late Pliocene ◽  
Millennial Scale

scholarly journals Factors determining the soil available water during the last two decades (1997–2019) in southern Spain

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (19) ◽  
Author(s):  
José A. Sillero-Medina ◽  
Jesús Rodrigo-Comino ◽  
José D. Ruiz-Sinoga
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Content ◽  
Southern Spain ◽  
Retention Capacity ◽  
Essential Information ◽  
Hydrological Conditions ◽  
Available Water ◽  
Available Water Content ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
The Impact

AbstractAssessing soil hydrological conditions can provide essential information for understanding the environmental processes that affect ecosystem services and, particularly in the context of ongoing climate change. This is key in areas affected by water scarcity such as the Mediterranean belt. Therefore, the main goals of this research are (i) to assess the main rainfall dynamics and trends of some representative hotspots along with southern Spain and (ii) to determine the impact on the soil available water content (AWC) over the last two decades. An analysis of daily precipitation and soil hydrological conditions was combined with soil sampling (543) and laboratory analyses to evaluate the properties related to the soil infiltration and retention capacity. The results show that the organic factors control soil properties and their hydrodynamics in southern Spain. Furthermore, a general declining trend in soil water availability is observed over the last two decades. This is more extreme in arid and semi-arid areas, where there have been several years in the last decade with more than 200 days without the available water content. Moreover, in these areas, heavy rainfall during specific moments of the year is the key factor that manifests a greater incidence in areas with steeper slopes, which in turn, also conditions the biological factors and the hydrodynamics of the soil. In short, in the context of climate change, the analysis of soil hydrological dynamics could be used to identify biodiversity thresholds in the Mediterranean area and even to detect phenological changes in specific plant species.

scholarly journals High resolution climate and vegetation simulations of the Late Pliocene, a model-data comparison over western Europe and the Mediterranean region

2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 585-606 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Jost ◽  
S. Fauquette ◽  
M. Kageyama ◽  
G. Krinner ◽  
G. Ramstein ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Hydrological Cycle ◽  
Annual Precipitation ◽  
Mean Annual Precipitation ◽  
Terrestrial Vegetation ◽  
Model Data ◽  
Late Pliocene ◽  
Data Comparison ◽  
The Mediterranean

Abstract. Here we perform a detailed comparison between climate model results and climate reconstructions in western Europe and the Mediterranean area for the mid-Piacenzian warm interval (ca 3 Myr ago) of the Late Pliocene epoch. This region is particularly well suited for such a comparison as several quantitative climate estimates from local pollen records are available. They show evidence for temperatures significantly warmer than today over the whole area, mean annual precipitation higher in northwestern Europe and equivalent to modern values in its southwestern part. To improve our comparison, we have performed high resolution simulations of the mid-Piacenzian climate using the LMDz atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) with a stretched grid which allows a finer resolution over Europe. In a first step, we applied the PRISM2 (Pliocene Research, Interpretation, and Synoptic Mapping) boundary conditions except that we used modern terrestrial vegetation. Second, we simulated the vegetation for this period by forcing the ORCHIDEE (Organizing Carbon and Hydrology in Dynamic Ecosystems) dynamic global vegetation model (DGVM) with the climatic outputs from the AGCM. We then supplied this simulated terrestrial vegetation cover as an additional boundary condition in a second AGCM run. This gives us the opportunity to investigate the model's sensitivity to the simulated vegetation changes in a global warming context. Model results and data show a great consistency for mean annual temperatures, indicating increases by up to 4°C in the study area, and some disparities, in particular in the northern Mediterranean sector, as regards winter and summer temperatures. Similar continental mean annual precipitation and moisture patterns are predicted by the model, which broadly underestimates the wetter conditions indicated by the data in northwestern Europe. The biogeophysical effects due to the changes in vegetation simulated by ORCHIDEE are weak, both in terms of the hydrological cycle and of the temperatures, at the regional scale of the European and Mediterranean mid-latitudes. In particular, they do not contribute to improve the model-data comparison. Their main influence concerns seasonal temperatures, with a decrease of the temperatures of the warmest month, and an overall reduction of the intensity of the continental hydrological cycle.

Reconstruction of environmental and climatic change during the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene in northwestern North America based on a new drill core from paleo-Lake Idaho

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederik Allstädt ◽  
Andreas Koutsodendris ◽  
Erwin Appel ◽  
Wolfgang Rösler ◽  
Alexander Prokopenko ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Northern Hemisphere ◽  
Moisture Transport ◽  
Snake River Plain ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Snake River ◽  
Depth Interval ◽  
Late Pliocene ◽  
River Plain ◽  
Northwestern North America

<p>The Pliocene to early Pleistocene yields a close analogy to near-future climate, with atmospheric <em>p</em>CO<sub>2</sub> between pre-industrial and anthropogenically perturbed levels as they may be reached in few decades. A sedimentary archive that is well suited to study Plio-Pleistocene climate dynamics in the terrestrial realm has recently become available through the ICDP-sponsored HOTSPOT project on the evolution of the Snake River Plain (Idaho, USA). At the Mountain Home site, HOTSPOT drilling has yielded the MHAFB11 core that comprises 635 m of fine-grained lacustrine sediments (Shervais et al. 2013). Based on the yet available paleomagnetic age control, these sediments span from the late Pliocene to the early Pleistocene, which makes them the first archive in continental North America that covers this time interval at one site. Based on their geographic position, the sediments from paleo-Lake Idaho can contribute to a better understanding of climate variability across the Plio-Pleistocene transition in western North America, notably with respect to the hypothesis that enhanced moisture transport into the higher latitudes of North America from ~2.7 Ma onwards allowed the initiation of Northern Hemisphere glaciation (Haug et al., 2005).</p><p>To gain insight into the paleoclimatic evolution of northwestern North America during the late Pliocene to early Pleistocene, we have palynologically analyzed 131 samples from the 732–439 m depth interval (corresponding to an age of ~2.8 to ~2 Ma) of the MHAFB11 core. The obtained palynological dataset, which has a mean temporal resolution of ~7 ka, documents that a <em>Pinus</em>-dominated coniferous forest biome prevailed in the catchment area of paleo-Lake Idaho throughout the study interval. However, percentages of pollen from conifer taxa decrease in the latest Pliocene before reaching consistently lower values in the early Pleistocene at ~2.4 Ma. In contrast, pollen taxa representing an open vegetation (e.g., <em>Artemisia</em>, Asteraceae) and deciduous trees (e.g., <em>Quercus</em>, <em>Betula</em> and <em>Alnus</em>) become increasingly abundant in the early Pleistocene (at ~2.4 Ma). We interpret this vegetation shift to an open mixed conifer/deciduous forest to be caused by wetter climate conditions. This interpretation is supported by quantitative climate estimates, which show a gradual increase in mean annual precipitation in the early Pleistocene. This trend towards wetter conditions supports the notion that enhanced moisture transport to northern North America from the subarctic Pacific Ocean contributed to the onset of Northern Hemisphere glaciation at ~2.7 Ma (Haug et al., 2005).</p><p> </p><p>References:</p><p>Haug, G.H., Ganopolski, A., Sigman, D.M., Rosell-Mele, A., Swann, G.E., Tiedemann, R., Jaccard, S.L., Bollmann, J., Maslin, M.A., Leng, M.J. and Eglinton, G., 2005. North Pacific seasonality and the glaciation of North America 2.7 million years ago. <em>Nature</em>, 433, 821-825.</p><p>Shervais, J.W., Schmitt, D.R., Nielson, D., Evans, J.P., Christiansen, E.H., Morgan, L.A., Shanks, P. W.C., Prokopenko, A.A., Lachmar, T., Liberty, L.M., Blackwell, D.D., Glen, J.M., Champion, D., Potter, K.E., Kessler, J., 2013. First Results from HOTSPOT: The Snake River Plain Scientific Drilling Project, Idaho, U.S.A. <em>Scientific</em> <em>Drilling,</em> 3, 36-45.</p><p> </p>

Biogeographic patterns and Plio-Pleistocene extinction of Bivalvia in the Mediterranean and southern North Sea

Paleobiology ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 368-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergio Raffi ◽  
Steven M. Stanley ◽  
Raffaella Marasti
Keyword(s):  
North Sea ◽  
Early Pleistocene ◽  
Tectonic Activity ◽  
Late Pliocene ◽  
Early Pliocene ◽  
Biogeographic Patterns ◽  
Ice Caps ◽  
The North ◽  
Isotopic Shifts ◽  
The Mediterranean

An evaluation of the history of polysyringian species (filibranchs and eulamellibranchs) reveals that the huge early Pliocene bivalve fauna of the Mediterranean Basin (MB) and North Sea Basin (NSB) suffered heavy extinction during late Pliocene and early Pleistocene time. This is evidenced by low survivorship of early Pliocene species in the Recent and by a decline in species richness of the two basins from 323 known early Pliocene species to 198 living species.Several kinds of evidence indicate that cooling rather than the areal effect of eustatic sea-level lowering was the primary cause of the excessive extinction: (1) heavy Plio-Pleistocene extinction of mollusks was not global but concentrated around the margins of the northern Atlantic—an ocean fringed by polar ice caps; (2) taxa of tropical affinities were most severely affected; (3) heavy extinction occurred in the MB in areas not marked by facies change; (4) in the MB the onset of extinctions coincided with the onset elsewhere, but because of tectonic activity, water depths in the MB were not under tight eustatic control; (5) 14 species present in both the MB and NSB during early Pliocene time are now restricted to waters south of the NSB; and (6) the majority of species common to the two basins during the early Pliocene (eurythermal species) have survived to the present.Molluscan data support palynological evidence that the climate in the MB was warmer and less seasonal in early Pliocene time than today, when latitudinal temperature gradients are steeper. Molluscan evidence indicates that the North Sea is exceptional in being less seasonal (though cooler) today than in early Pliocene time, and we attribute this anomaly to the local effects of the Gulf Stream, which was strengthened in mid-Pliocene time by the uplift of the Isthmus of Panama.The heavy extinction in the MB and NSB about 3.2–3.0 ma ago approximately coincided with the earliest deposition of glacial tills in Iceland and with isotopic shifts in the tests of planktonic foraminifers preserved in deep-sea cores. Additional heavy extinction probably coincided with a pulse of severe cooling in late Pliocene time, 2.5–2.4 ma ago. Heavy extinction of mollusks in the MB and NSB continued into the early Pleistocene but not into the middle and late Pleistocene, apparently because by this time it was primarily only eurythermal species that survived. Today the molluscan faunas of the MB and NSB are unusually eurythermal; few species are restricted to a single biogeographic province.

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