How can we discover environments of the distant past?

What is a bog core sample?

A ‘bog core sample’

What does pollen look like? Betula pendula (birch) Quercus robur (oak)Pinus sylvestris (pine) Salix alba (willow)Corylus avellana (hazel) Fraxinus excelsior (ash)

Your own ‘pollen sample’

Years before present BirchPineHazelElmOakLimeAlderAshWillow ,000 11,000 12,000

Tree species are adapted to different environments

Climatic changes during the Holocene During the Early Holocene (c. 11,500 BP up to 5000 BP) the climate became warmer and wetter. Melting glaciers caused a rapid rise in sea level, with a rise of >30mm/yr at some sites. The present sea level was typically reached at around 6,000 BP Rainfall increased, and desert and tundra regions of the earth shrank. Forest ecosystems spread in the warmer, moister conditions. Humans moved from a meat-based diet based on hunting animals through open habitats to sedentary farming, that suited the new climate. During the later Holocene (c BP), temperatures in temperate latitudes began to cool again. Data from

How did amounts of pollen vary?

Abstract of a journal article The sediment and pollen stratigraphy of a radiocarbon-dated sequence from a lake on the eastern margin of Breckland is described. The record extends from to 1620 B.P. From to 9560 B.P. the vegetation was an open Betula woodland. Movement of sand by wind was one factor keeping the vegetation open. Between 9560 and 9255 B.P. a denser Betula woodland developed, to be replaced by a closed woodland dominated by Corylus avellana, with Pinus sylvestris, Ulmus and Quercus. During this period, Quercus gradually replaced P. sylvestis on the local sandy soils. Corylus avellana remained the woodland dominant until about 7140 B.P., when it was replaced by Tilia cordata. Alnus glutinosa expanded in response to raised water levels at about 6800 B.P., Fraxinus excelsior became an important component of the local woods, also replacing C. avellana. The elm decline occurred in two phases, at 6000 and 4500 B.P. Substantial forest clearance did not begin until about 2500 B.P. The spread of heath vegetation on the Breckland began at about 2250 B.P. From ‘Devensian late-glacial and Flandrian vegetational history at Hockham Mere, Norfolk, England’, K.D. Bennett, New Phytologist, 95, (1983)