The pollen record of human influencenat Paanajärvi

Abstract

Cores of the uppermost laminated sediment were taken from three locations along Lake Paanajärvi, for fine-scale pollen study. The pollen diagrams can be correlated with the written history of the area. The wars and peace treaties that affected the frontier between Finland and Russia, now 3.5 km west of the lake, affected the settlements and thus the pollen sequence. From the correlations it is clear that the Karelians were the first around Paanajärvi to use cultivated grasses and a slash-and-burn method. Secale and Cerealia are the best indicators for this period. Other indicators like Rumex, Chenopodiaceae and Juniperus also reflect the impact. The Karelians abandoned the area after a cultivation period of about one hundred years. After this the area was only occasionally cultivated for about another hundred years. Then came the Finns with permanent field cultivation. Their period lasted for about 100 years until World War Two. Subsequent cultivation of particular species is well documented and can be compared with the pollen results. The last fifty years abandoned fields are clearly represented in the uppermost samples of the diagrams. Here the best indicators are the increased values for tree pollen. Some of the pollen types, like Quercus and Artemisia t., are clearly from longdistance dispersal.