The deglacial forest conundrum

Anne Dallmeyer (), Thomas Kleinen, Martin Claussen, Nils Weitzel, Xianyong Cao and Ulrike Herzschuh
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Anne Dallmeyer: Max Planck Institute for Meteorology
Thomas Kleinen: Max Planck Institute for Meteorology
Martin Claussen: Max Planck Institute for Meteorology
Nils Weitzel: Heidelberg University
Xianyong Cao: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Ulrike Herzschuh: Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research

Nature Communications, 2022, vol. 13, issue 1, 1-10

Abstract: Abstract How fast the Northern Hemisphere (NH) forest biome tracks strongly warming climates is largely unknown. Regional studies reveal lags between decades and millennia. Here we report a conundrum: Deglacial forest expansion in the NH extra-tropics occurs approximately 4000 years earlier in a transient MPI-ESM1.2 simulation than shown by pollen-based biome reconstructions. Shortcomings in the model and the reconstructions could both contribute to this mismatch, leaving the underlying causes unresolved. The simulated vegetation responds within decades to simulated climate changes, which agree with pollen-independent reconstructions. Thus, we can exclude climate biases as main driver for differences. Instead, the mismatch points at a multi-millennial disequilibrium of the NH forest biome to the climate signal. Therefore, the evaluation of time-slice simulations in strongly changing climates with pollen records should be critically reassessed. Our results imply that NH forests may be responding much slower to ongoing climate changes than Earth System Models predict.

Date: 2022
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-33646-6

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