Paleoecological evidence of pre-contact human impacts on fire and vegetation in northern New York State, United States of America

The impacts of indigenous populations on fire and vegetation dynamics in North America prior to European contact are poorly understood. This study investigates the influence of pre-Contact populations on fire and vegetation dynamics, integrating paleoecological evidence from lake sediment studies with archaeological data. The study area is in northern New York, U.S.A., an area with numerous documented pre-Contact Iroquoian settlements.; Pollen and charcoal records were developed from three lakes. One lake, Rutland Lake, has numerous Iroquoian sites within several kilometers of its basin with the potential to influence its paleoecological record. Two additional sites, Clear Pond and Goose Lake, occur in areas without documented settlements. These sites provide comparison records that allow me to distinguish possible signals of anthropogenic impact from those of climate.; Archaeological information on aboriginal settlement patterns and chronologies near Rutland Lake was used to develop a model of Iroquoian land use near Rutland Lake in the pre-Contact period. This ‘land clearance history’ was then compared to the lake sediment data to identify possible signals of anthropogenic impact.; Results indicate that changes in paleoecological records can be linked to activities such as limited forest clearance for maize cultivation. Patterns observed in the Rutland Lake record indicative of anthropogenic influence coincide approximately with periods of the highest density of aboriginal settlement. Signals of anthropogenic impact include increased sedimentation, decreases in late-successional arboreal taxa such as Fagus, increases in early successional arboreal taxa, increases in non-arboreal taxa, and an increase in charcoal accumulation rates. Strengthening this interpretation is that none of these trends are observed at the other two sites.; I also derived a land clearance history for the Crawford Lake, Ontario area, where debate over anthropogenic versus climatic forcing of vegetation change has continued. Comparison of the Rutland Lake and Crawford Lake records reveals similar patterns in sedimentation, charcoal accumulation rates, and vegetation change. Differences in the records can be linked to the proximity and density of settlement during the pre-Contact era in their respective watersheds. This comparison argues for a strong role of human activity in influencing the history of vegetation and fire at Crawford Lake.