Towards quantitative reconstruction of peatland nutrient status from fens

In rich fens, unlike bogs, the key drivers structuring testate amoeba communities are related to nutrient status, suggesting the potential for transfer functions to quantitatively reconstruct changing nutrient status from palaeoecological records. Such records could be useful tools to investigate the long-term impacts of pollution and landscape change. Here, we derive and test transfer functions for pH, water-table depth, conductivity and Ca and Mg concentrations using a data set from Polish fens. Results show that transfer functions for Ca and conductivity have apparent predictive power for surface samples; these models will require further validation and testing with palaeoecological data. Testate amoeba transfer functions for fen nutrient status may be a valuable addition to the peatland palaeoecologist’s tool-kit, although further work will be required to demonstrate their usefulness in practice.

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