Nogué, S;
Whicher, K;
Baker, AG;
Bhagwat, SA;
Willis, KJ;
(2017)
Phytolith analysis reveals the intensity of past land use change in the Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot.
Quaternary International
, 437
(Part B)
pp. 82-89.
10.1016/j.quaint.2015.11.113.
Preview |
Text
Sandra - nogue_etal_qi_final.pdf Download (732kB) | Preview |
Abstract
This paper presents a study of phytoliths (opal silica bodies from plants) from sediment sequences obtained from two tropical forest patches in the Western Ghats of India: a sacred grove (sequence covers last 550 cal BP) and a forest patch in a plantation (sequence covers last 7500 cal BP). The sites are located at mid-elevation (c. 650–1400 m above sea level) in a mosaic landscape showing anthropogenic open habitats and plantations as well as some evergreen forests. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the landscape composition of grassland and forest over time in the region, grassland being invariably shaped by anthropogenic activities, particularly fire for cultivation. We identified and classified phytoliths into 34 morphotypes from five taxonomic groups: Poaceae (grasses), Cyperaceae (sedges), Arecaceae (palms), Pteridopsida (ferns) and woody dicotyledons (broad-leaved trees and shrubs). We also calculated the humidity–aridity index (Iph). First, our results show that grasses are the most represented phytolith types in both sites, followed by broad-leaved trees and shrubs, palms, sedges, and ferns. Second, the highly variable climatic index Iph over the last 1000 years suggest that changes in phytolith percentage (e.g. broad-leaved trees) might be caused by human agro-pastoral activities, such as clearing through fires and irrigation. Prior to these human activities, the phytolith signal for early Holocene climate is congruent with the existing literature. Finally, this study compares new phytolith results with previous pollen data from the same sites. We find good agreement between these two botanical proxies throughout, thus validating our findings. We provide important evidence regarding the history of environmental change due to anthropogenic activities in the Western Ghats. This has important implications because it provides insights into how tropical forest will respond to increased intensity of human activities.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Phytolith analysis reveals the intensity of past land use change in the Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.quaint.2015.11.113 |
| Publisher version: | http://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2015.11.113 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. This manuscript is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial Non-derivative 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for personal and non-commercial use providing author and publisher attribution is clearly stated. Further details about CC BY licenses are available at http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0. Access may be initially restricted by the publisher. |
| Keywords: | Land-use change, Local dynamics, Holocene, Phytoliths, Tropical forest, Western Ghats |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1477484 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
