QUANTIFYING TERMINAL WHITE BANDS IN SALIX FROM THE YENISEI RIVER,
SIBERIA AND THEIR RELATIONSHIP TO LATE-SEASON FLOODING
Abstract
Recent, record-breaking discharge in the Yenisei River, Siberia, is part
of a larger trend of increasing river flow in the Arctic driven by
Arctic Amplification (AA). These changes in magnitude and timing of
discharge can lead to increased risk of extreme flood events, with
implications for infrastructure, ecosystems, and climate. To better
understand the changes taking place, it is useful to have records that
help place recent hydrological changes in context. In addition to an
existing network of river gauges, wood anatomical features in riparian
trees have been shown to record extreme flooding. Along the lower
reaches of the Yenisei River we collected white willow (Salix alba)
samples from a fluvial fill flat terrace that occasionally floods when
water levels are extremely high. At the end of certain annual growth
rings these samples displayed terminal white bands, a type of
intra-annual density fluctuation (IADF). To identify the characteristics
and causes of these features we use an approach known as quantitative
wood anatomy (QWA) to measure variation in fiber cell dimensions across
tree rings, particularly fiber lumen area (LA) and cell wall thickness
(CWT). We investigate (1) which cell parameters and method to extract
intra-annual data from annual tree rings best capture terminal white
bands identified in Salix, and (2) if these patterns are related to
flood magnitude and/or duration. We find that fiber CWT best captures
the IADFs found in Salix rings. For some trees, time series of
normalized CWT correlate with July flood durations, which have changed
since the 1980s. Understanding how riparian vegetation responds to
extreme flood events can help us better manage riparian ecosystems and
understand changes to the Arctic hydrological regime.