Signal strength and climate calibration of a European tree-ring isotope network

Abstract

[1] We present the first European network of tree ring δ13C and δ18O, containing 23 sites from Finland to Morocco. Common climate signals are found over broad climatic‐ecological ranges. In temperate regions we find positive correlations with summer maximum temperatures and negative correlations with summer precipitation and Palmer Drought Severity Indices (PDSI) with no obvious species‐specific differences. Regional δ13C and δ18O chronologies share high common variance in year‐to‐year variations. Long‐term variations, however, exhibit differences that may reflect spatial variability in environmental forcings, age trends and/or plant physiological responses to increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration. Rotated principal component analysis (RPCA) and climate field correlations enable the identification of four sub‐regions in the δ18O network ‐ northern and eastern Central Europe, Scandinavia and the western Mediterranean. Regional patterns in the δ13C network are less clear and are timescale dependent. Our results indicate that future reconstruction efforts should concentrate on δ18O data in the identified European regions.