Peatland initiation in Central European Russia during the Holocene: Effect of climate conditions and fires

Abstract

Peatlands store massive amounts of organic carbon, but the fate of this carbon remains unclear as global climate continues to warm. The age of peatland inception and the main drivers of peat initiation are one of the most important issues in Holocene paleoecology, especially for the numerous but under investigated peatlands in European Russia. This paper introduces new peatland initiation ages for 44 mires in three areas located in the central part of European Russia within the Polesie landscape belt. This region is characterised by waterlogged sandy plains and flat surface topography. Phases of peatland initiation were compared with Holocene fire regime derived from macro-charcoal data as well as with regional climatic reconstructions. We found that peat inception in the region started around 12,000 cal yr BP, but the most active phases of peatland initiation took place during the periods 8500–7500, 7000–6000, 5300–5800, 4000–3500 and 1700–1200 cal yr BP. Expect for rapid peat growth during the early Holocene, peatland initiation mostly coincided with warm climatic periods and increased fire frequency. Forest soil paludification in poorly drained Polesie landscapes was presumably enhanced by reduced evapotranspiration and changes in water balance due to disturbance of forest cover after wildfires. We expect that rising air temperature in the current century will cause higher fire frequencies and may encourage waterlogging of forests and ecosystem transformation.