Tree-Ring Evidence for the 1913 Eruption of Volcán de Fuego de Colima, Mexico

Abstract

Dendrochronological records provide various types of evidence for the impact of volcanic activity, which can then be used to quantify the amount of risk associated with this environmental hazard. Major explosive volcanic eruptions that inject dust and aerosols into the stratosphere are capable of causing large-scale surface cooling (Minnis et al. 1993). Distant, large-scale networks of temperature sensitive tree-ring chronologies reflect those eruptions either in anatomical xylem features, such as frost damage (LaMarche and Hirschboeck 1984), or in measured annual growth parameters, especially maximum latewood density (Briffa et al. 1998). Trees growing close enough to the volcano to be covered with tephra may either be killed or survive depending on tephra layer thickness and coarseness (Yamaguchi 1985). Surviving trees experience abrupt suppression of radial growth (Druce 1966; Hinckley et al. 1984), including locally absent rings (Yamaguchi 1983). Such initial response can generate prolonged periods of reduced radial increment (Segura et al. 1995b; Smiley 1958), or be followed by greater than normal growth rates (Abrams et al. 1999; Hinckley et al. 1998; Segura et al. 1995a).