Tree-Rings and Climate in Morocco

Abstract

Two sites located near Ketama in the Morocco Rif have been selected, on the basis of limiting climatic factors, in order to study the relationship between tree rings and climate. After the trend associated with biological factors related to increasing age has been removed and all variables have been standardized, some statistical parameters have been computed and a variance analysis has been performed. After the persistence has been eliminated, an original technique of multiple regression on the principal components and of selection of the most significant variables has been built. Twenty -four climatic variables have been used. The principal aim of this paper is to describe this original statistical technique of data analysis and to illustrate its power with dendroclimatological data in Morocco. For the temperate site located in low altitude (1280 m), among the most important variables, we have retained total monthly precipitation for August, mean temperature of January, April, and May of the current year and mean temperature of October of the previous year. For the cold site (2100 m), total monthly precipitation for September and temperatures of January and May of the current year and precipitation for October of the previous year definitely influence the growth rate of cedars.