Faculty
Social Science
Supervisor Name
David Goldblum
Keywords
Dendrochronology, Tree Rings
Description
The science of dendrochronology involves the dating of tree rings and analysis of their annual growth rates. It is important to conduct field studies to determine what tree species in a given area are suitable for analysis. This project began by coring Acer plantanoides, Acer saccharinum, Acer saccharum, and Picea abies from the Fanshawe Conservation Area in London, Ontario. Each core was prepped using standard procedures and analyzed for the visibility of annual rings. The tree rings of Acer plantanoides and Acer saccharinum were inadequate for accurate dating, and thus, only Acer saccharum and Picea abies were used and included in this poster. Ring widths of Acer saccharum and Picea abies were measured using WinDENDRO™ and COFECHA was used to evaluate the correlations of annual ring widths across the cores of each species. The intercorrelations of Acer saccharum were 0.404 and 0.571 for Picea abies. A standardized chronology was created by ARSTAN to analyze and compare annual growth rates across both species. Acer Saccharum and Picea abies both differed in their annual growth rates and degree of variability. Acer Saccharum had lower annual variation and overall lower annual growth rates than Picea abies. This project can be further expanded upon to include climate correlations in an attempt to explain the difference in growth rates and variability.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to the USRI program and its program coordinators, the Department of Geography and Environment, the Upper Thames RIver Conservation Authority, and my supervisor Dr. Goldblum for all his support.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Document Type
Poster
Included in
An Explorative Study of the Methods used in Dendrochronology and its Applications
The science of dendrochronology involves the dating of tree rings and analysis of their annual growth rates. It is important to conduct field studies to determine what tree species in a given area are suitable for analysis. This project began by coring Acer plantanoides, Acer saccharinum, Acer saccharum, and Picea abies from the Fanshawe Conservation Area in London, Ontario. Each core was prepped using standard procedures and analyzed for the visibility of annual rings. The tree rings of Acer plantanoides and Acer saccharinum were inadequate for accurate dating, and thus, only Acer saccharum and Picea abies were used and included in this poster. Ring widths of Acer saccharum and Picea abies were measured using WinDENDRO™ and COFECHA was used to evaluate the correlations of annual ring widths across the cores of each species. The intercorrelations of Acer saccharum were 0.404 and 0.571 for Picea abies. A standardized chronology was created by ARSTAN to analyze and compare annual growth rates across both species. Acer Saccharum and Picea abies both differed in their annual growth rates and degree of variability. Acer Saccharum had lower annual variation and overall lower annual growth rates than Picea abies. This project can be further expanded upon to include climate correlations in an attempt to explain the difference in growth rates and variability.