Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T18:55:42.008Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Relationships between leaf morphology and climate, Bolivia: implications for estimating paleoclimate from fossil floras

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2016

Kathryn M. Gregory-Wodzicki
Kathryn M. Gregory-Wodzicki*
Affiliation:
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, Palisades, New York 10964-8000. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Fossil floras are an important source of quantitative terrestrial paleoclimate data. Many paleoclimate estimates are based on relationships observed in modern vegetation between leaf morphology and climate, such as the increase in the percentage of entire-margined species with increasing temperature and the increase in leaf size with increasing precipitation. An important question is whether these observed relationships are universal or regional; for example, recent studies suggest that significant differences exist between floras from three domains: the Northern Hemisphere, New Zealand/Australia, and subalpine zones. Also, debate exists over which statistical models of modern data sets, univariate or multivariate, provide the most accurate estimates of paleoclimate. In this study, 12 foliage samples from living Bolivian forests are compared with data sets from different regions. Models based on data sets from North America and Japan, namely the Climate-Leaf Analysis Multivariate Program (CLAMP) data set of J. A. Wolfe, and from east Asia produce reasonably accurate estimates of temperature and precipitation, suggesting that the climate-leaf morphology relationships for Bolivian vegetation do not differ significantly from those for Northern Hemisphere vegetation. The mean leaf size for a given mean annual precipitation is smaller than for a data set from the Western Hemisphere and Africa, but this difference is most likely due to different sampling methods. As for estimating climate from fossil floras, these results, along with the analysis of four other regional data sets, imply that the most accurate climate estimates will be produced by the predictor data set with the most similar climate-leaf morphology relationships. Unfortunately, our present lack of understanding of why climate-morphology relationships vary between the North America/Japan, New Zealand/Australia, and subalpine domains makes it difficult to identify data sets similar to paleofloras. Until we learn more, it is probably best to compare fossil floras to predictor data sets from the same domain. The performance of the various statistical methods depends on the nature of the predictor data set. Multiple regression analysis tends to produce the most accurate estimates for small data sets with a narrow range of environmental variation that have similar relationships to the flora, and linear regression or canonical correspondence analysis for the larger and more varied CLAMP data set. If a similar predictor data set is not available, then nearest-neighbor analysis can still produce accurate paleoclimate estimates.

Type
Articles
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 26 , Issue 4 , Fall 2000 , pp. 668 - 688
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Literature Cited

Bailey, I. W., and Sinnott, E. W. 1915. A botanical index of Cretaceous and Tertiary climates. Science 41:831–834.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baker-Brosh, K. F., and Peet, R. K. 1997. The ecological significance of lobed and toothed leaves in temperate forest trees. Ecology 78:1250–1255.Google Scholar
Bao, H., Koch, P. L., and Rumble, D. III. 1999. Paleocene-Eocene climatic variation in western North America: evidence from the δ18O of pedogenic hematite. Geological Society of America Bulletin 111:1405–1415.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beck, S. G., Killeen, T. J. and García, E. E. 1993. Vegetación de Bolivia. Pp. 6–24in Killeen, T. J., García, E.E., and Beck, S. G., eds. Guía de arboles de Bolivia. Quipus, La Paz, Bolivia.Google Scholar
Chase, C. G., Gregory-Wodzicki, K. M., Parrish-Jones, J. T., and DeCelles, P. 1998. Topographic history of the western Cordillera of North America and controls on climate. Pp. 73–99in Crowley, T. J. and Burke, K., eds. Tectonic boundary conditions for climate model simulations. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Forest, C. E., Wolfe, J. A., Molnar, P., and Emmanuel, K. A. 1999. Paleoaltimetry incorporating atmospheric physics and botanical estimates of paleoclimate. Geological Society of America Bulletin 111:497–511.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Givnish, T. 1979. On the adaptive significance of leaf form. Pp. 375–407in Solbrig, O. T., Jain, S., Johnson, G. B., and Raven, P. H., eds. Topics in plant population biology. Columbia University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Givnish, T. 1984. Leaf and canopy adaptations in tropical forests. Pp. 51–84in Medina, E., Mooney, H. A., and Vásquez-Yánes, C., eds. Physiological ecology of plants of the wet tropics: proceedings of an international symposium held in Oxatepec and Los Tuxtlas, Mexico, June 29 to July 6, 1983. W. Junk, The Hague.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Givnish, T. 1987. Comparative studies of leaf form: assessing the relative roles of selective pressures and phylogenetic constraints. New Phytologist 106(Suppl.):131–160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenwood, D. R. 1992. Taphonomic constraints on foliar physiognomic interpretations of late Cretaceous and Tertiary palaeoclimates. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 71:149–190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gregory, K. M., and McIntosh, W. C. 1996. Paleoclimate and paleoelevation of the Oligocene Pitch-Pinnacle flora, Sawatch Range, Colorado. Geological Society of America Bulletin 108:545–561.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halloy, S. R. P., and Mark, A. F. 1996. Comparative leaf morphology spectra of plant communities in New Zealand, the Andes and the European Alps. Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand 26:41–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Herman, A. B., and Spicer, R. A. 1997. New quantitative palaeoclimate data for the Late Cretaceous Arctic: evidence for a warm polar ocean. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 128:227–251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, B. F. 1999. Estimation of rainfall variables from leaf characters in tropical Africa. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 145:231–250.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jordan, G. J. 1997. Uncertainty in paleoclimatic reconstructions based on leaf physiognomy. Australian Journal of Botany 45:527–547.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kennedy, E. M. 1998. Cretaceous and Tertiary megafloras from New Zealand and their climate signals. . Open University, Milton Keynes, England.Google Scholar
Mosbrugger, V., and Roth, A. 1996. Biomechanics in fossil plant biology. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 90:195–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parkhurst, D. F., and Loucks, O. L. 1972. Optimal leaf size in relation to environment. Journal of Ecology 60:505–537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richards, P. W., 1996. The tropical rain forest, 2d ed.Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Rivera, M. O., Libermann, M., Beck, S., and Moraes, M. 1996. Vegetación de Bolivia. Pp. 169–222in Mihotek, K. B., ed. Comunidades, territorios indígenas y biodiversidad en Bolivia. Centro de Investigación y Manejo de Recursos Naturales Renovables, Santa Cruz, Bolivia.Google Scholar
Roth, A., Mosbrugger, V., Belz, G., and Neugebauer, H. J. 1995. Hydrodynamic modeling study of angiosperm leaf venation types. Botanica Acta 108:121–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roth, J. L., and Dilcher, D. L. 1978. Some considerations in leaf size and leaf margin analysis of fossil leaves. Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg 30:165–171.Google Scholar
Sokal, R. R., and Rohlf, F. J. 1995. Biometry, 3d ed.W. H. Freeman, New York.Google Scholar
Stranks, L. 1996. Physiognomic and taphonomic studies in New Zealand and Australia: implications for the use of palaeobotany as a tool for palaeoclimate estimation. . Oxford University, Oxford.Google Scholar
Stranks, L., and England, P. 1997. The use of a resemblance function in the measurement of climatic parameters from the physiognomy of woody dicotyledons. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 131:15–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
ter Braak, C. J. F., and Prentice, I. C. 1988. A theory of gradient analysis. Advances in Ecological Research 18:271–317.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vose, R. S., Schmoyer, R. L., Steurer, P. M., Peterson, T. C., Heim, R., Karl, T. R., and Eischeid, J. K. 1992. The global historical climatology network: long-term monthly temperature, precipitation, sea level pressure, and station pressure data. Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center Numeric Data Package Collection, Version 1.02. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tenn.Google Scholar
Wiemann, M. C., Manchester, S. R., Dilcher, D. L., Hinojosa, L. F., and Wheeler, E. A. 1998. Estimation of temperature and precipitation from morphological characters of dicotyledonous leaves. American Journal of Botany 85:1796–1802.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilf, P., 1997. When are leaves good thermometers? Paleobiology 23:373–390.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilf, P., Wing, S. L., Greenwood, D. R., and Greenwood, C. L. 1998. Using fossil leaves as paleoprecipitation indicators: an Eocene example. Geology 26:203–206.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilf, P., Wing, S. L., Greenwood, D. R., and Greenwood, C. L. 1999. Using fossil leaves as paleoprecipitation indicators: an Eocene example—Reply. Geology 27:92.Google Scholar
Wing, S. L., and Greenwood, D. R. 1993. Fossils and fossil climate: the case for equable continental interiors in the Eocene. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 341:243–252.Google Scholar
Wolfe, J. A. 1979. Temperature parameters of humid to mesic forests of eastern Asia and relation to forests of other regions of the Northern Hemisphere and Australasia. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1106.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfe, J. A. 1993. A method of obtaining climatic parameters from leaf assemblages. U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 2040.Google Scholar
Wolfe, J. A. 1995. Paleoclimatic estimates from Tertiary leaf assemblages. Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences 23:119–142.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfe, J. A., and Uemura, K. 1999. Using fossil leaves as paleoprecipitation indicators: an Eocene example—Comment. Geology 27:91–92.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfe, J. A., Forest, C. E., and Molnar, P. 1998. Paleobotanical evidence of Eocene and Oligocene paleoaltitudes in midlatitude western North America. Geological Society of America Bulletin 110:664–678.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar