Recent Environmental Change in the Southwestern Canadian Plains

This paper examines 20th‐century environmental change in the subhumid southwestern Canadian Plains, specifically in relation to the dominant agricultural landscape and to the climate of the past millennium as reconstructed from proxy data. Anthropogenic landscape change in the last century has been dominated by the conversion of grasslands to ranchland and cropland. This has heightened landscape vulnerability to climatic fluctuations, especially drought. Instrumental climate records, extending back to the 1880s, highlight the variability of precipitation in this region. Proxy environmental records, derived from lake cores and tree‐ring analysis, extend this picture into the last millennium and show that drought has been a recurring theme of the Prairie climate. Tree‐ring records suggest that some droughts in the last millennium may have exceeded in severity any in the instrumental record. The sustainability of Prairie agriculture depends on adaptation to the amplitudes of climatic change and variability evident in these proxy records. Dans cet article nous examinons les changements environnementaux qui sont survenus pendant le 20 ème siècle dans les plaines canadiennes sèches du sud‐ouest, spécifiquement par rapport au paysage agricole dominant et au climat du dernier millénaire qui a été déterminéà partir de données de procuration. La transformation des prairies en ranchland et cropland est le changement du paysage le plus important dont l'homme est responsable, pour le dernier siècle. À cause de ce changement, le paysage est plus vulnérable aux fluctuations climatiques ‐ à la sécheresse en particulier. Les enregistrements instrumentaux de climat, qui reculent jusqu'aux années 1880, mettent en évidence la variabilité des précipitations dans cette région. Les enregistrements environnementaux de procuration, dérivés d'échantillons pris dans les lacs et de la dendroanalyse, étendent cette image dans le dernier millénaire et prouvent que le thème de la sécheresse est apparu souvent dans les analyses du climat du prairie. Les enregistrements de boucles d'arbre suggèrent que, dans le dernier millénaire il y avait des sécheresses qui étaient peut‐être si sévères que les instruments n'ont pas pu les enregistrer. Si l'agriculture veut survivre comme entreprise dans les prairies, il faudra qu'elle s'adapte aux amplitudes de changement et de variabilité du climat qui ont été constatées dans les données de procuration

Archaeology · Climate change · Dendrochronology · Geography · Physical geography · Ecology · Fire effects on ecosystems · Forestry · Geology and Paleoclimatology Research · Tree-ring climate responses

• Dendroclimatic Analysis of White Spruce at its Southern Limit of Distribution in the Spruce Woods Provincial Park, Manitoba, Canada

  Sophan Chhin, G Geoff Wang et al.•Tree-Ring Research•2004

  Añadir item

• Hydroclimatic Change in Southern Manitoba Since A.D. 1409 Inferred from Tree Rings

  Open Access•Scott St George, Erik Nielsen•Quaternary Research•2002

  Añadir item

• Palliser’s Triangle

  Open Access•S A Wolfe, SA Wolfe et al.•The Holocene•2013

  Añadir item

• Dendroclimatic reconstruction of precipitation for sites in the southern Canadian Rockies

  Open Access•Emma Watson, Brian H Luckman•The Holocene•2001

  Añadir item

• Health Consequences of Drought on the Canadian Prairies

  Open Access•Karen E Smoyer-Tomic, Karen E Smoyer‐Tomic et al.•EcoHealth•2004

  Añadir item

• Biological evidence of multiple temporal and spatial scales of hydrological variation in the western interior of Canada

  Open Access•Glen M Macdonald, Roslyn A Case•Quaternary International•2000

  Añadir item

• Forcing of hydroclimatic variability in the northwestern Great Plains since AD 1406

  Open Access•Suzan L Lapp, Jeannine-Marie St Jacques et al.•Quaternary International•2013

  Añadir item

• Late Holocene temporal constraints for human occupation levels at the Bodo archaeological locality, east-central Alberta, Canada using radiocarbon and luminescence chronologies

  Kennedy Munyikwa, Krista Gilliland et al.•Plains Anthropologist•2014

  Añadir item

• Progress in Canadian Geomorphology and Hydrology 1996–2000

  Open Access•HOUSTON C SAUNDERSON, Dan J Smith et al.•Canadian Geographies /…•2000

  Añadir item

• Why so much concern about climate change and so little attention to land use change

  Open Access•Olav Slaymaker•Canadian Geographies /…•2001

  Añadir item

• Landscape and Climate Change in the Central Canadian Rockies During the 20th Century

  Open Access•Brian H Luckman•Canadian Geographies /…•1998

  Añadir item

• Late Holocene Eolian Activity in the Mineralogically Mature Nebraska Sand Hills

  Open Access•Daniel R Muhs, Thomas W Stafford et al.•Quaternary Research•1997

  Añadir item

• A Dendroclimatic Reconstruction of Annual Precipitation on the Western Canadian Prairies since A.D. 1505 from Pinus flexilis James

  Open Access•Roslyn A Case, Glen M Macdonald•Quaternary Research•1995

  Añadir item

• Neoglacial Glacier Fluctuations in the Canadian Rockies

  Open Access•Brian H Luckman, Gerald Holdsworth et al.•Quaternary Research•1993

  Añadir item

• Evidence of Active Dune Sand on the Great Plains in the 19th Century from Accounts of Early Explorers

  Open Access•Daniel R Muhs, Vance T Holliday•Quaternary Research•1995

  Añadir item

• Climate, History And The Modern World

  Hubert H Lamb•Climate, History And The Modern…•2002

  Añadir item

• Tree-ring based reconstruction of summer temperatures at the Columbia Icefield, Alberta, Canada, AD 1073-1983

  Open Access•Brian H Luckman, Keith R Briffa et al.•The Holocene•1997

  Añadir item

• Little Ice Age' aridity in the North American Great Plains

  Open Access•Sherilyn C Fritz, Daniel R Engstrom et al.•The Holocene•1994

  Añadir item

• Global Surface Air Temperature Variations During the Twentieth Century

  Open Access•P D Jones, Keith R Briffa•The Holocene•1992

  Añadir item

• Nineteenth-century climate in the Devils Lake region as reconstructed from palaeolimnological proxies

  Open Access•Sherilyn C Fritz, Daniel R Engstrom et al.•The Holocene•1996

  Añadir item

• Holocene comment and reply

  Open Access•Gregg J Wiche, Robert M Lent et al.•The Holocene•1996

  Añadir item

• Empire of Dust

  Morris Mott, David C Jones•Journal of American History•1988

  Añadir item

• Extended 14 C Data Base and Revised Calib 3.0 14 C Age Calibration Program

  Open Access•Minze Stuiver, Paula J Reimer•Radiocarbon•1993

  Añadir item

• Historical Atlas of Canada. II

  GED MARTIN, R Louis Gentilcore•Transactions of the Institute of…•1994

  Añadir item

• The Decline of Summerfallow on the Canadian Prairies

  Open Access•William J Carlyle•Canadian Geographies /…•1997

  Añadir item

• Parabolic Dunes

  Open Access•S A Wolfe, Peter P David•Canadian Geographies /…•1997

  Añadir item

• Landscape and Climate Change in the Central Canadian Rockies During the 20th Century

  Open Access•Brian H Luckman•Canadian Geographies /…•1998

  Añadir item

• The Nature and Origin of the Canadian Dry Belt

  Jack Richard Villmow•Annals of the Association of…•1956

  Añadir item