NOAA/WDS Paleoclimatology - Tigalmamine, Morocco Air Temperature Reconstruction during the Holocene

Annual precipitation, July and January temperatures were reconstructed from a continuous Holocene pollen sequence from the Middle Atlas, Morocco, using the best modern analogues method. The reconstructions show a clear difference between the early and late Holocene: from ∼10 ka to ∼6.5 ka the climate was drier and warmer than during the period since 6.5 ka. The average value of annual precipitation was ∼870 mm until 6.5 ka, then rose to ∼940 mm. Between 10 ka and 6.5 ka January and July temperatures were about 4 °C higher than the present. Both temperatures show a marked decrease between 7 ka and 6 ka. After 6.5 ka July and January temperatures fluctuated between 21 and 23 °C, and 2.5 and 5 °C respectively. January temperatures show a period of intermediate values (∼3.5 °C) between 4 ka and 5.5 ka. The reconstructed climate values generally match palaeolimnological data from the same core, which show five intervals of low lake level during the Holocene. They are also consistent with regional-scale COHMAP simulated palaeoclimate that shows contrasting patterns of rainfall variation between the northwesternmost part of Africa and the intertropical band. This dataset was contributed as part of the Temperature-12k project (doi.org). Data were contributed to the project from the original data generators, who are listed in the Investigator field of this template file. Additional notes regarding the use of these data in the Temperature-12k project can be found in the LiPD file listed as an Online_Resource of this template file.