Abstract / Description of output
Charcoal occurrence is extensively used as a tool for understanding wildfires over geological timescales. Yet, the fossil charcoal literature to date rarely considers that fire alone is capable of creating a bias in the abundance and nature of charcoal it creates, before it even becomes incorporated into the fossil record. In this study we have used state-of-the-art calorimetry to experimentally produce charcoal from 20 species that represent a range of surface fuels and growth habits, as a preliminary step towards assessing whether different fuel types (and plant organs) are equally likely to remain as charcoal post-fire. We observe that charcoal production appears to be species specific, and is related to the intrinsic physical and chemical properties of a given fuel. Our observations therefore suggest that some taxa are likely to be overrepresented in fossil charcoal assemblages (i.e. needle-shed conifers, tree ferns) and others poorly represented, or not preserved at all (i.e. broad shoot-shed conifers, weedy angiosperms, shrub angiosperms, some ferns). Our study highlights the complexity of charcoal production in modern fuels and we consider what a bias in charcoal production may mean for our understanding of palaeowildfires.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 159-171 |
Number of pages | 13 |
Journal | Palaeontology |
Volume | 61 |
Issue number | 2 |
Early online date | 12 Nov 2017 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Mar 2018 |
Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)
- fuel type
- wildfires
- experimental
- charcoal
- fossil charcoal
- ATMOSPHERIC OXYGEN
- FIRE
- FOREST
- FLAMMABILITY
- COMBUSTION
- LITTER
- SPREAD
- CARBON
- TEMPERATURE
- ANGIOSPERMS