Heyerdahl Fire History from Sophie Lake Tree Rings

NOAA/WDS Paleoclimatology archives the Heyerdahl fire history data from Sophie Lake, Montana. The dataset provides a fire history reconstruction spanning 340 calendar years, from 371 to 31 years before present. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) maintains this record.

Use Cases

• Reconstruct fire event years from tree-ring fire scar data for Sophie Lake.
• Analyze fire frequency and return intervals over the 340-year period.
• Correlate fire history timelines with other paleoclimate proxies for Montana.
• Calibrate regional fire regime models using the documented historical fire dates.

Strengths

• Covers a 340-year time series (371 to 31 years BP)
• Data is archived and curated by NOAA's authoritative World Data Service for Paleoclimatology

Limitations

• Dataset has a specific geographic bias, covering only the Sophie Lake area in Montana
• Temporal coverage ends 31 years BP, lacking modern-era fire records
• Exact sample size (number of tree cores/samples) is unknown

Provenance

Source

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) / World Data Service for Paleoclimatology

Collection Method

Tree-ring analysis (dendrochronology) for fire scar detection.

Time Range

371 to 31 calendar years before present (BP).

Freshness

null

Geography

Sophie Lake, Montana, United States of America.