By combining multiple analyses we have clearly demonstrated a substantial increase in plant growth since the 1960s, coincident with changes to the local climate
-Jessica Royles, Lead Author
The Peninsula sustains moss banks some of which are more than 5000 years old. A team from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), the University of Cambridge and the University of Exeter sampled the most southerly known moss bank, at Lazarev Bay on Alexander Island, in 2008. The researchers extracted a short peat core from the bank and, using radiocarbon dating techniques, ascertained the start of peat accumulation to have been around the year 1860. Microscopic tests established it was formed from a single species (Polytrichum strictum).
The Antarctic Peninsula is known to have witnessed significant warming since the 1950s, when official records started. Records from BAS’ Rothera research station show the Peninsula warmed by between 1 and 1.4°C per decade during the 1980s and ‘90s. Along with one of the fastest rates of warming anywhere on the planet, the Peninsula has also seen significant increases in precipitation. The length of the melt season has been steadily increasing since 1948 with earlier thawing and later freezing extending the growing season.
These trends have led to changes in the physical environment of the Peninsula. Ice cover has reduced, exposing land to settlement by a variety of flora, the most common of which is moss.
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Image: Aerial photograph of sample location: an unnamed peninsula at Lazarev Bay on the northwest coast of Alexander Island
Credit: Professor Peter Convey, Britsh Antarctic Survey
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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