Publication Abstracts

Peteet et al. 2011

Peteet, D.M., E. Markgraf, D.C. Pederson, and S. Sritrairat, 2011: Linking uplands to the Hudson River. In Environmental History of the Hudson River: Human Uses that Changed the Ecology, Ecology that Changed Human Uses. R.E. Henshaw, Ed., SUNY Press, pp. 123-134.

The wetlands of the Hudson Valley provide valuable archives for understanding how climate change and anthropogenic impact have influenced the region. Recent pollen, macrofossil, charcoal, and loss-on-ignition (LOI) data from a suite of cores on a downriver transect allow comparison of uplands and river marshes. In the mid-Hudson Region, wetland sediments from Rhododendron Swamp, Shawangunk Mountains, and Black Rock Forest pond/fen are compared to Hudson National Estuarine Research Reserve (HNERR) Tivoli Bay, Iona Marsh, and Piermont marsh records. All of these sites indicate forest decline about four hundred years ago, coeval with a rise in invasive species such as ragweed. While upland lakes record the regional forest history, small wetlands such as fens, bogs, and swamps with a rich macrofossil component enhance our ecological and climatic reconstructions. In the river marsh environments where sedimentation rates are high, the Medieval Warm Period (MWP), with elevated charcoal from the watershed, is conspicuous.

In the lower Hudson Valley, records from Piermont Marsh and the Hackensack Marsh are compared to an Alpine Swamp record from atop the Palisades in Alpine, New Jersey. Upland farming/lumbering/industry is recorded by a decline of trees concurrent with a rise of weedy species such as ragweed and plantain and paralleled by the same markers in the river wetlands. At the same time, the marshes document dramatic disappearances of a diverse local marsh flora with the encroachment of cattail and the highly invasive common reed. Both inorganic sediment input and butrient supply were altered by human activity. Sensitive to climate changes and droughts in particular, Hudson marshes record the shifts in upland vegetation along with watershed increases in inorganic input, charcoal, and foraminifera. Learning from the historial perspective enhances our ability to preserve, restore, and manage both upland wetlands and marshed as the region prepares for rising sea level, warmer temperatures, and further invasions.

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BibTeX Citation

@inbook{pe07400c,
  author={Peteet, D. M. and Markgraf, E. and Pederson, D. C. and Sritrairat, S.},
  editor={Henshaw, R. E.},
  title={Linking uplands to the Hudson River},
  booktitle={Environmental History of the Hudson River: Human Uses that Changed the Ecology, Ecology that Changed Human Uses},
  year={2011},
  pages={123--134},
  publisher={SUNY Press},
}

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RIS Citation

TY  - CHAP
ID  - pe07400c
AU  - Peteet, D. M.
AU  - Markgraf, E.
AU  - Pederson, D. C.
AU  - Sritrairat, S.
ED  - Henshaw, R. E.
PY  - 2011
TI  - Linking uplands to the Hudson River
BT  - Environmental History of the Hudson River: Human Uses that Changed the Ecology, Ecology that Changed Human Uses
SP  - 123
EP  - 134
PB  - SUNY Press
ER  -

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