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- Title
An 850-year tree-ring-based reconstruction of drought history in the western Qilian Mountains of northwestern China.
- Authors
Gou, Xiaohua; Gao, Linlin; Deng, Yang; Chen, Fahu; Yang, Meixue; Still, Christopher
- Abstract
ABSTRACT Studies of regional drought history will be helpful for understanding current hydroclimate variability with global warming as well as predicting future hydroclimate shifts. Long-term tree-ring records are scarce in the western Qilian Mountains of northwestern China, which is also the western boundary of the natural distribution of Qilian Juniper ( Juniperus przewalskii Kom.) in this area. Here, we present an 850-year ( AD 1161-2010) reconstruction of May-July self-calibrating Palmer Drought Severity Index ( scPDSI) in the western Qilian Mountains that is based on two nearly millennia of ring-width chronologies derived from long-lived Qilian Juniper trees. The reconstruction suggests a relatively dry phase from the 15th century to the 18th century during the Little Ice Age ( LIA) and a relatively wet period over the past two centuries. This reconstruction is consistent with other tree-ring-based hydroclimatic reconstructions from the northeastern Tibetan Plateau, as well as the corresponding century-scale solar activity during the LIA. The three mega-drought periods ( AD 1260s-1340s, 1430s-1540s and 1640s-1740s) recorded by the tree-ring series also correspond to the Wolf, Spörer and Maunder solar activity minimum periods. Results of the multi-tape method analysis and wavelet analysis further confirmed the relationship between regional hydroclimate variability and solar activity forcing.
- Subjects
QILIAN Mountains (China); DROUGHTS; TREE-rings; JUNIPERS; PRECIPITATION variability; SOLAR activity; HISTORY
- Publication
International Journal of Climatology, 2015, Vol 35, Issue 11, p3308
- ISSN
0899-8418
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1002/joc.4208