Start Date
2022
Description
The picture of Great Lakes Region (GLR) climate since deglaciation (about 14,000 years ago) is unclear, especially in terms of the hydroclimate (how dry, or rainy, or windy it has been). It is important to have information about past environments, and periods of past climate changes, to inform how we think about current/future climate changes, especially at regional scales. Understanding the climate of the past requires proxies for past environmental conditions, such as charcoal, pollen, or microfossils preserved in lake mud. But assessing climate change over geological time scales in the GLR is complicated by a lack of such sedimentary records, especially from interior locations, and for lack of synthesis of available data. This aim of this study is to conduct a literature review of the paleoclimate studies available in the GLR and to evaluate Flat Iron Lake (Calvin Ecosystem Preserve) as a potential future site to work on a sedimentary archive for the Michigan interior.
Recommended Citation
Atma, Luke and Higley, Melinda C., "Great Lakes Paleoclimate Review" (2022). Summer Research. 2.
https://digitalcommons.calvin.edu/summer_research/2022/Posters/2
Included in
Great Lakes Paleoclimate Review
The picture of Great Lakes Region (GLR) climate since deglaciation (about 14,000 years ago) is unclear, especially in terms of the hydroclimate (how dry, or rainy, or windy it has been). It is important to have information about past environments, and periods of past climate changes, to inform how we think about current/future climate changes, especially at regional scales. Understanding the climate of the past requires proxies for past environmental conditions, such as charcoal, pollen, or microfossils preserved in lake mud. But assessing climate change over geological time scales in the GLR is complicated by a lack of such sedimentary records, especially from interior locations, and for lack of synthesis of available data. This aim of this study is to conduct a literature review of the paleoclimate studies available in the GLR and to evaluate Flat Iron Lake (Calvin Ecosystem Preserve) as a potential future site to work on a sedimentary archive for the Michigan interior.
