An Atlas of Past and Present Pollen Maps for Europe: 0-13000 Years Ago, and The Overlay Maps.

The history of soil erosion and fluvial deposits in small catchments of central Europe: Deciphering the long-term interaction between humans and the environment — A review

The analysis of palaeoenvironmental archives—sediments, archaeological remains, tree-rings, documents and instrumental records—is presented as a key element in the global scientific endeavour aimed at understanding human–environment interactions at the present day and in the future. The paper explains the need for the focus on palaeoenvironmental studies as a means of ‘learning from the past’, and presents the rationale and structure of the IGBP-PAGES Focus 5 programme ‘Past Ecosystem Processes and Human–Environment Interactions’. The past, as described through palaeoenvironmental studies, can yield information about pre-impact states, trajectories of recent change, causation, complex system behaviour, and provide the basis for developing and testing simulation models. Learning from the past in each of these epistemological categories is exemplified with published case-studies.

Human–environment interactions: learning from the past

Sensitivity of West and Central European river systems to environmental changes during the Holocene A review

The rivers of the world are undergoing accelerated change in the Anthropocene, and need to be managed at much broader spatial and temporal scales than before. Fluvial remote sensing now offers a technical and methodological framework that can be deployed to monitor the processes at work and to assess the trajectories of rivers in the Anthropocene. In this paper, we review research investigating past, present and future fluvial corridor conditions and processes using remote sensing and we consider emerging challenges facing fluvial and riparian research. We introduce a suite of remote sensing methods designed to diagnose river changes at reach to regional scales. We then focus on identification of channel patterns and acting processes from satellite, airborne or ground acquisitions. These techniques range from grain scales to landform scales, and from real time scales to inter-annual scales. We discuss how remote sensing data can now be coupled to catchment scale models that simulate sediment transfer within connected river networks. We also consider future opportunities in terms of datasets and other resources which are likely to impact river management and monitoring at the global scale. We conclude with a summary of challenges and prospects for remotely sensed rivers in the Anthropocene.

/pdf/remotely-sensed-rivers-in-the-anthropocene-state-of-the-art-4sc06svdd3.pdf

Remotely sensed rivers in the Anthropocene: state of the art and prospects

/pdf/natural-vs-anthropogenic-streams-in-europe-history-ecology-2tasuefx10.pdf

Natural vs anthropogenic streams in Europe: History, ecology and implications for restoration, river-rewilding and riverine ecosystem services

Analysis of a 2–3 m thick vertical sequence of fine-grained overbank alluvial sediments on the foreland of the Eastern Sudety Mountains reveals that these sediments resulted from human land use changes. Following the Holocene climatic amelioration the first farmers and breeders, migrating northward from the Danube Basin, crossed the limit of the Sudety–Carpathians and settled the loess-covered Glubczyce Plateau about 7000 years ago. The farming and breeding tribes of Early Bronze Age created the compact settlement structure of the Lusitian culture here about 1600–1300 years BC. The first forest clearance began at this time. Slavic settlements existed here in Early Medieval times from at least the 6th and 7th centuries onwards. Later, economic expansion of the Opole Duchy and increased population density (up to 20–30 persons/km2) caused an increase in soil erosion and flood amplitudes.



Investigation of small-radius palaeomeander infills adjacent to the main channels indicates that fossilization of organic material that filled these palaeochannels started in Early Medieval times due to more frequent flood waves and an increased rate of overbank sedimentation. In channel undercuts, ‘older’ alluvia have well-developed cambic gleyo-fluvisols while ‘younger’ homogenous alluvia do not have traces of soil processes. Analysis of heavy metal concentrations in ‘older’ and ‘younger’ deposits indicates very similar concentrations of cadmium, copper, lead and zinc. This indicates that the source of these alluvia was the transfer of sediments from the mainly deforested part of the drainage basin. Therefore, since at least Early Medieval times, and possibly even earlier, the Glubczyce Plateau has been a deforested region. Despite the mountainous character of the headwater area of rivers in the Eastern Sudety foreland, sediment transfer from sub-mountainous loess-covered uplands, induced by human activity, is clearly marked in the granulometric and geochemical properties of the vertical sequences of overbank deposits. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Human-induced overbank sedimentation in the foreland of the Eastern Sudety Mountains

The undulating loess Kanczuga Plateau, 250–270 m a.s.l., is located in the temperate climatic zone of Central Europe, within the northern foreland of the Carpathians. It is dissected by a network of valleys 30–60 m deep, infilled with several metres of complex minerogenic and organic deposits which started to accumulate during the early Holocene. The southern side of one of these valleys is dissected by several dry valleys. The mouth sections of these valleys have buried surface comprising peat and/or organic silts, overlain by sandy–silty alluvium. 14C dates indicate that the alluviation of these valley floors, which proceeded from the headwaters to the mouth sections, began in the 1100 ad. The gradual intensification of soil erosion in the upper part of the catchment and associated sedimentation probably encompassed only a few centuries, with greatest alluviation during the Little Ice Age. This plateau, which is under the influence of more continental climatic conditions than the low-mountain and upland regions of Western Europe, features more climatic contrasts. Here environmental changes triggered by land use were superimposed on climatic change. The most intensive processes of soil erosion and sediment transfer as well as alluviation, coincided with the first phase of cooling during the Little Ice Age. It was the final stage of the intensification of these processes, probably more intensive than its initial phase in the eleventh century, caused primarily by deforestation resulting from the development of agriculture.

Kazimierz Klimek

Papers

Natural vs anthropogenic streams in Europe: History, ecology and implications for restoration, river-rewilding and riverine ecosystem services

Human-induced overbank sedimentation in the foreland of the Eastern Sudety Mountains

Historical deforestation as a cause of alluviation in small valleys, subcarpathian loess plateau, Poland

Response of small mid-mountain rivers to human impact with particular reference to the last 200 years; Eastern Sudetes, Central Europe

Climatic nad human impact on episodic alluviation in small mountain valleys, The Sudetes