Determining Past Climate Change - Dendrochronology

• one ring per year
• distance between tree rings can tell you something about temperature and moisture fluctuations related to climatic variability

Other data offering clues about our past climate:

• lake-bottom sediment and soil deposits
• pollen in deep ice caves, soil deposits, and sea sediments
• geologic evidence is ancient coal beds, sand dunes, and fossils
• documents concerning droughts, floods, and crop yields

Knowledge on past climate is still incomplete....., but what do we know from the aforementioned data sources?????

image adopted from The Amosphere by Lutgens and Tarbuck, © 1998 by Prentice-Hall, Inc