Fire, climate, and geomorphic response in Yellowstone

Publications available:

Meyer, G.A., Wells, S.G., and Jull, A.J.T., 1995, Fire and alluvial chronology in Yellowstone National Park: Climatic and intrinsic controls on Holocene geomorphic processes: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 107, p. 1211-1230. (PDF file – right-click to download and save)

Meyer, G.A., and Wells, S.G., 1997, Fire-related sedimentation events on alluvial fans, Yellowstone National Park, U.S.A.: Journal of Sedimentary Research, v. A67, p. 776-791. (abstract)

Click on graphics for larger image.

	Gravel-poor, charcoal-rich facies of a fire-related debris flow on an alluvial fan, Slough Creek valley, NE Yellowstone, 1989. Similar deposits were dated in Holocene fans.
	1989 fire-related debris flow overlying 1988 burned soil surface (thin black charred layer), Gibbon Canyon, Yellowstone NP. Similar well-preserved burned surfaces are common in Holocene fans, and dates on charred material provide ages for probable fire-related deposits that overlie them.
	Chronology of mid-late Holocene fire-related sedimentation and fluvial terrace tread development (T2 etc.) compared to local paleoclimatic indicators (from Meyer et al., 1995) (click on graph for larger image). Dotted vertical blue lines represent maxima of ice-rafted debris events and cool episodes in the North Atlantic, from Bond et. al (1997) – note their consistent correspondence with minima in fire-related sedimentation. Fire-induced debris flows and fire-related alluvial-fan deposition are most active in warmer episodes with stronger summer droughts and more intense thunderstorm precipitation that typically generates alluvial-fan sedimentation. Overbank sedimentation on terraces (green bars) occurs during cooler episodes, probably with more consistent flooding in snowmelt runoff. Charcoal accumulation rates in lake sediments are from Millspaugh (1997); grass-sagebrush pollen data are from Gennett and Baker (1986).