The mid-Holocene in China is traditionally thought to be a warm and humid period with a strong summer monsoon, and is often termed the Holocene Climatic Optimum or Megathermal Period. Here we present lake geomorphologic and lithological evidence from the Alashan Plateau, part of the Mongolian Plateau, that indicates strong lake desiccation during the mid-Holocene. High resolution pollen data from Zhuyeze Lake, at the present summer monsoon margin, is also presented. These data show that present lakes and wetlands in the Juyanze Lake basin west of the Badain Jaran desert, in the Zhuyeze Lake basin between the Badain Jaran and Tengger deserts, and in lakes in the eastern Tengger desert, dried or experienced low lake levels in the mid-Holocene around 5000—7000 cal yr BP. Pollen data further indicate that the vegetation cover declined in both the local areas and in the Qilian Mountains, suggesting the climate was drier than that associated with the present Asian summer monsoon. This mid-Holocene drought interval was present throughout a quite large region of the south Inner Mongolian Plateau. The period was also probably colder, at least in the high Asian plateaus and mountains.
Study on two loess sections, one located at Wu-wei near the Tengger Desert in northwestern China, another located near Ganzi at the southeast margin of the Tibetan Plateau in southwest China, reveals a coeval drying step occurred at -250 kaBP. It is expressed by the increase in eolian grain-size at Wuwei, and by a drastic extension of C4 plants and a decrease of loess chemical weathering intensity at Ganzi. Examination of the available eolian data indicates that the event has also been clearly documented in the loess sections near the deserts in northern China, and in the eolian records from the North Pacific. On the contrary, the signal is rather weak for the central and southern Loess Plateau regions as well as for Central Asia, where the climates are influenced by the southeast Asian monsoon and the westerlies, respectively. Since the climate at Ganzi is under strong control of the southwest Asian monsoon, we interpret this drying step as a result of decreased influence of the southwest summer
The area along the eastern and southeastern margins of the Tengger Desert, NW China, which is sensitive to the summer monsoon variations, was selectedfor studying the environmental conditions surrounding the transition between Paleolithic foragers and Neolithic farmer/pastoral- ists. Short cores were obtained from four lake basins in the southwestern Tengger using a hand-driven piston coring device. Proxies from these cores were supplemented by ra- diocarbon ages obtained from lake sediment cores, shoreline features and spring mound deposits. Together these records provide evidence of millennial-scale climate change events from the Pleistocene-Holocene transition to the present. Lake/wetland events, representing periods of more intensive summer monsoon, occur in the records at ～12.7-11.6, ～10.1, ～9.3, ～8.0, ～5.4, ～1.5, and ～0.8 ka BP. They do suggest that century- to millennial-scale climatic cycles are characteristic of the Holocene in the southeastern Tengger Desert although the chronology must be considered extremely tentative.
Short cores of about 80-cm retrieved from three main basins of the deepwater areas in Qinghai Lake, the largest inland enclosed lake in China, were studied. Stable isotopes of authigenic carbonates, grain-size, carbonate and organic matter content at 5-year resolution are used to reconstruct the climatic history over the last 800 years in the Northeastern Tibetan Plateau. Chronology was established according to 210Pb dating and 137Cs methods and the core correlation. It is found that cores from different deep basins of the lake can be well correlated. The sedimentary rate is highest in the western basin of the lake and lowest in the east. In the southern basin of the lake where the short core Qing-6 is located, the recent average sedimentation rate is 0.1004 cm/yr. Variations in effective precipitation recorded by the oxygen isotopes and grain size data during the last 800 years are consistent with the glacial accumulation record form the Dunde and Guliya ice cores. A dry climate lasted for 300 years from 1200 AD to 1500 AD, followed by a wet period from 1500 to 1560 AD. The two dry periods, 1560 to 1650 AD and 1780 to 1850 AD, were the results of southwest monsoon weakening. The effective precipitation generally increased since 1650 AD due to the strengthening of the Asian Southwest Monsoon, resulting in a wet period until the 1950s. Except the early stage, the Little Ice Age on the Plateau is characterized by increased effective moisture. Organic mat- ter content, with nearly 200-year cycles, shows similar trend with the atmospheric delta carbon-14 before the 1850s, indicating that the bioproductivity responds to solar activity.
A c. 300-year oxygen and carbon isotope record derived from fine-grained and ostracod carbonate from Qinghai Lake testifies to dramatic interannual tointerdecadal limnological change. Fine-grained carbonates, which are mainly authigenic, are likely to have formed in the epilimnion of the lake and their isotopic composition reflects the summer temperature and, more importantly, the isotopic composition of the near-surface waters, which is mainly a function of evaporative concentration. Ostracod shells are secreted in the benthos of the lake, and their isotopic composition reflects summer bottom-water conditions, together with fractionation effects, which may differ between species. Differences betweencontemporaneous values from authigenic carbonates and ostracod shells may provide an indication of stratification within the lake and variations in effective precipitation over the northeast part of the Tibetan Plateau over the past 300 years. A period of moderate evaporative concentration, from about 300 to 100 yr BP, was interrupted by a marked wet phase from ～100 to 40 yr BP, which was in turnfollowed by a return to drier conditions in the most recent part of the record.The increase in ? 18O values in the latter part of the record accords well withinstrumental records of lake-level lowering and salinity increase since about 1955 AD.
Pollen analysis of 30 modem water samples from the Shivang River, an internal river system located between the Tengger and Badain Jaran deserts, Northwest China was carried out to examine the river's capacity to carry pollen and spores, and to assess the contribution of the water-borne pollen to pollen assemblages in lake sediments at the end of the river system. Results indicate the pollen assemblages in water samples consist of both local and upland pollen. Percentages of upland pollen reach 30% - 60%, and pollen assemblages in water samples do not indicate the nature of local vegetation at the sampling sites. Fluvial currents have the capacity to transport large quantities of pollen long distances, and the contribution of this fluvial transported pollen is relatively high, For example, percentages of Picea Dietr. pollen in water samples at sampling sites 130 km and 145 km away from Picea forests reach 16.5% and 7.7%, respectively. Fluvial pollen transport occurs primarily during flood periods, and pollen concentrations from the flood samples are 17.1 - 12.5 times those from normal fluvial flow. Reservoirs affect pollen transportation since pollen is deposited at reservoir inlets and pollen concentrations are much reduced at reservoir outlets. Human activity can thus change natural features of pollen transportation and deposition. The main factors influencing pollen concentrations and assemblages are sampling time, sampling location, and rainfall intensity.
