Early stages of secondary succession recorded in soil pollen on the North Carolina Piedmont

Conditions just prior to field abandonment and the early stages of forest regeneration have residual effects on patterns of forest regeneration, but are often not available for study. The potential of pollen preserved in acidic soils to reconstruct land-use immediately before field abandonment was tested here by comparing known stand histories with analysis of pollen which had washed downward into the soil. Large amounts of Ambrosia in the soil pollen, accompanied by Asteraceae and Poaceae, indicated that a site was a plowed field prior to the start of forest regeneration. Abrupt shifts in proportions of Pinus and Quercus pollen correlated with known logging histories. Sites of unknown history included similar diversity in the proportions of nonarboreal pollen, and no evidence of logging. Proportions of tree taxa in soil pollen and vegetation surveys correlated only weakly. Soil pollen analysis, under appropriate conditions of pollen preservation, can provide evidence of major differences in site histories for which there is otherwise little evidence.