The influence of extreme high and low temperatures and precipitation totals on pollen seasons of Ambrosia, Poaceae and Populus in Szeged, southern Hungary

Abstract

Extreme high and low temperatures and precipitation totals may have important effect on daily and annual pollen concentrations. The aim of this study is to analyse the associations between pollen characteristics and meteorological variables, furthermore between the rank of pollen characteristics and the rank of annual values of meteorological variables for Szeged, southern Hungary. Pollen characteristics include pollen count parameters (TPA, total annual pollen amount; APC, annual peak pollen concentration) and pollen season parameters (start, end and duration of the pollen season). Meteorological variables are temperature and precipitation. The data set used covers a 14-year period (1997-2010) and contains daily values of Ambrosia (ragweed), Poaceae (grasses) and Populus (poplar) pollen concentrations, as well as those of temperature and precipitation. Both Pearson and Spearman rank correlations were calculated, because the rank correlation is less sensitive than the correlation to outliers that are in the tails of the sample. Our results suggest that Ambrosia and Populus are reversely related to temperature (negative correlations), while Poaceae exhibit a parallel relationship with precipitation (positive correlations). On the whole, pollen count characteristics (TPA and APC) indicate a decrease for Ambrosia and Poaceae, while for Populus an increase is expected. © 2012 Copyright 2012 Collegium Palynologicum Scandinavicum.