Landscape and climate changes in the Preboreal in the northwestern European Russia

High-resolution multi-proxy studies of lake sediments, including AMS 14C dating, lithology, loss-on-ignition measurements, pollen analysis and identification of plant macrofossils, of Lake Seliger (57°17'N, 33°04'Е) and five other lacustrine records from the adjacent areas used for comparison, make it possible to reconstruct the main changes in the productivity of lakes and vegetation development in response to the short-term climatic oscillations during the Late Glacial and early Holocene. The analysis showed that lacustrine sedimentation at all these sites began 13–14.5 cal kyr BP, in the Allerød Interstadial, when spruce, birch and pine began to spread in the northwest of European Russia forming the open woodlands. A substantial cooling in the Younger Dryas caused a rapid decline of forest communities and a re-advance of the tundra-steppe vegetation with scattered groups of trees in the protected habitats. The composition of lake sediments changed everywhere in a similar way – from predominantly mineral deposits in the Late Glacial to those with high organic contents (gyttja) in the early Holocene. Following the rapid warming at the Late Glacial/Holocene transition, woodlands formed by birch and, later, pine expanded again over the area. A short-term cooling 11.4–11.2 cal kyr BP, coeval with the Preboreal Oscillation observed in the Greenland ice-core records, most clearly manifested itself by a decrease in the proportion of organic matter in lake sediments. It also interrupted or slowed down the expansion of birch and pine forests and caused a new spread of open grassland vegetation. However, the impact of this cooling on the vegetation development and lake ecosystems in the northwest of European Russia was probably weaker than in western and central Europe. At the beginning of the late Preboreal, there was a new rapid shift to a warmer and more humid climate, when birch forests expanded again, followed later by pine. Further warming during the Boreal brought about the introduction of broadleaved tree species into forest communities and a decrease in the landscape role of birch forests. At this time, some lakes were filled, and lacustrine sedimentation was replaced by the formation of peat.

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