Degree of connectivity in reconstructed precipitation dynamics and extremes for semiarid regions across South Siberia

Tree rings from forest-steppes of temperate continental Asia are useful proxies for the moisture regime reconstructions, encompassing environmental variations such as warming climate, changing frequency and intensity of droughts. Heterogeneity of precipitation leaves open the question of the probability of spatially large-scale droughts in this macro-region. Theoretically, such events could be driven by global tele-connections and/or common astronomic cycles. We have attempted the precipitation reconstructions of two distant (~1000 km) intermountain valleys in South Siberia, based on the tree ring width of Pinus sylvestris L. To enhance the quality of the precipitation reconstruction models, networks of existing tree-ring data were expanded and daily precision of instrumental precipitation series was implemented for calibration. Within-region (150-200 km) common signal between local chronologies r=0.37-0.90 (p Data Availability Statement Temperature and precipitation series of climatic stations were obtained from the website of All-Russia Research Institute of Hydrometeorological Information, World Data Centre (RIHMI-WDC, http://meteo.ru/data ). Other climatic time series and solar activity series were obtained from the website of The Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI) Climate Explorer ( https://climexp.knmi.nl ). Used in the study tree-ring width measurements will be submitted to the International Tree-Ring Data Bank (ITRDB; https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/paleoclimatology/tree-ring ) upon publication of the manuscript and with reference to it.