Quaternary History of Vegetation and Climate of Hawaii

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Paleoecological research in the Hawaiian Islands will provide new information about whether systems of the tropical Pacific Ocean before, during and since the last glacial maximum, perhaps leading to a better understanding of the discrepancy between continental and marine temperature records. Changes in past vegetation will be determined from fossil pollen, wood and charcoal in peat bogs and in soils buried beneath lava flows. Statistical methods of interpretation will be developed, relating modern pollen assemblages and plant distributions to the extensive data base on modern climates on the Islands. Four peat bogs have been located, at elevations varying from 500 m to 1400 m above sea level, with records extending from the present back to the last glacial maximum, and two of the bogs have bottom dates 36,000 and 41,000 years. Samples are already available from over 100 buried charcoal deposits. The locations of fossil sites along an elevational transect and rainfall gradient controlled by the trade winds means they can provide information about past lapse rates, the strength of the trade winds and the elevation of the trade wind inversion.