Category Archives: Palaeohydrology

Autocorrelation in the testate amoeba calibration set

Posted on 10/12/2018 by richard telford

Amesbury et al examine the autocorrelation in their huge calibration set. I thought I would do the same, increasing the resolution of the analysis to get a better handle on what is going on. This is an RNE plot. It … Continue reading →

Posted in Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature, transfer function | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Testing testate amoeba: some comments on Amesbury et al (2018)

Posted on 01/12/2018 by richard telford

Today, I have been reading and thinking about a new paper presenting a huge testate-amoeba calibration set for reconstructing water table depth in bogs (Amesbury et al 2018). This calibration set, with almost 2000 samples, is the synthesis of many … Continue reading →

Posted in Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature, transfer function | Tagged , | 1 Comment

The elevation of Lake Tilo

Posted on 15/10/2018 by richard telford

For my PhD, I studied the palaeolimnology of two lakes in the Ethiopian rift valley, using diatoms to reconstruct changes in the water chemistry of Lake Awassa, an oligosaline caldera lake which retains its low salinity despite having no effluent … Continue reading →

Posted in Data manipulation, Palaeohydrology, R, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Significance testing testate amoeba water table reconstructions

Posted on 16/02/2016 by richard telford

Testate amoeba live in bogs, their shell or test is preserved in the peat after death. Some species seem to prefer drier conditions, others prefer wetter conditions. And thus we have the prerequisites for constructing a transfer function to reconstruct … Continue reading →

Posted in Palaeohydrology, transfer function | Tagged , | Leave a comment

You don’t have to explain everything

Posted on 23/10/2015 by richard telford

So many papers present interesting palaeo-data and then add a badly done analysis that attempts to prove that the palaeo-data correlate (if you squint hard enough) with the Carriaco Basin record, NGRIP or the solar insolation reconstruction. This is not … Continue reading →

Posted in Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature | Tagged | 1 Comment

On the niche of Thalassiosira faurii, perils in palaeoecology

Posted on 12/04/2014 by richard telford

Palaeoenvironmental conditions can be reconstructed from microfossils preserved in sediments using the relationship between species and the environment. Usually the species’ relationships with the environment — their niches — are insufficiently constrained by experimental data, so we are forced to rely upon observations of … Continue reading →

Posted in climate, Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature, transfer function | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Mayfly mandibles: as seen in the IPCC report

Posted on 05/10/2013 by richard telford

I have been reading through the palaeoclimate chapter in the new IPCC report, in part so I can write a post on transfer functions in the report for Victor Venema’s climate scientists’ reviews. This post is not that review, instead I want … Continue reading →

Posted in climate, Novel proxies, Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Hydrological modelling of a small lake – implications for palaeohydrology

Posted on 17/07/2013 by richard telford

Palaeohydrological studies on closed-lakes (lakes without an outflowing river) make a lot of sense. I did my PhD on this type of system in Ethiopia. When the precipitation/evaporation ratio is high, lake level is high and salinity is low, and … Continue reading →

Posted in climate, Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature, transfer function | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Water Lilies – Setting Sun: Review of Stolze et al (2013)

Posted on 06/07/2013 by richard telford

This is part of my critical review of the palaeoenvironmental evidence for the influence of solar activity on climate. Stolze, S., Muscheler, R., Dörfler, W., Nelle, O. (2013) Solar influence on climate variability and human development during the Neolithic: evidence from a … Continue reading →

Posted in Palaeohydrology, Peer reviewed literature, solar variability | Tagged , , | 2 Comments