Event Title

Ghosts of Cultivation Past - Native American Legacy Shapes Tree Patterning More Than Habitat Requirements

Start Date

31-10-2013 11:00 AM

Description

The ecological legacy of indigenous cultures, particularly as plant transporters and cultivators, remains a contentious and unresolved matter. Historical records indicate that Native Americans likely transported and cultivated trees, but evidence is mostly anecdotal, and subsequent dispersal and large-scale, post-industrial land use may obliterate any patterning. Gleditsia triacanthos (honey locust) is a large-seeded tree whose putative large-mammal dispersers went extinct near the end of the last glacial period (~12,000 ya). Several disjunct G. triacanthos populations occur in the rural southern Appalachian Mountains, and historical records indicate its widespread use by Native Americans until approximately 500 ya, making it an excellent study plant to investigate an indigenous dispersal legacy. I investigate whether there is a quantifiable G. triacanthos association with Native American archeological sites in the southern Appalachian Mountains. The G. triacanthos distribution patterns indeed appear more a legacy of Native American agricultural practices than current habitat requirements, indicating a poor correlation between its distribution and suitable habitat. Moreover, the G. triacanthos appears severely dispersal limited, except in the presence of domestic cattle, and in spite of occurring in the riparian areas of rivers that flood. That a Cherokee/G. triacanthos cultivation legacy persists to the extent that the tree remains more strongly paired with a centuries-old legacy than its extant niche requirements, suggests that great caution must be exercised when correlating species distributions with current climate to assume niche requirements.

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Oct 31st, 11:00 AM

Ghosts of Cultivation Past - Native American Legacy Shapes Tree Patterning More Than Habitat Requirements

The ecological legacy of indigenous cultures, particularly as plant transporters and cultivators, remains a contentious and unresolved matter. Historical records indicate that Native Americans likely transported and cultivated trees, but evidence is mostly anecdotal, and subsequent dispersal and large-scale, post-industrial land use may obliterate any patterning. Gleditsia triacanthos (honey locust) is a large-seeded tree whose putative large-mammal dispersers went extinct near the end of the last glacial period (~12,000 ya). Several disjunct G. triacanthos populations occur in the rural southern Appalachian Mountains, and historical records indicate its widespread use by Native Americans until approximately 500 ya, making it an excellent study plant to investigate an indigenous dispersal legacy. I investigate whether there is a quantifiable G. triacanthos association with Native American archeological sites in the southern Appalachian Mountains. The G. triacanthos distribution patterns indeed appear more a legacy of Native American agricultural practices than current habitat requirements, indicating a poor correlation between its distribution and suitable habitat. Moreover, the G. triacanthos appears severely dispersal limited, except in the presence of domestic cattle, and in spite of occurring in the riparian areas of rivers that flood. That a Cherokee/G. triacanthos cultivation legacy persists to the extent that the tree remains more strongly paired with a centuries-old legacy than its extant niche requirements, suggests that great caution must be exercised when correlating species distributions with current climate to assume niche requirements.