Two Reconstructions of August-July Precipitation for Central Northern Arizona from Tree Rings

Abstract

This study reports two multi-century regional reconstructions of annual precipitation based on Pinus ponderosa and P. edulis from four sites in central northern Arizona. It compares standard regional and time-nested methods to generate reconstructions from 1581-2016 C.E. and 1529-2016 C.E., respectively. The strongest climate relationship is a positive correlation between total ring width and 12-month total precipitation ending in July of the growth year. The chronologies account for 50% of the variance of observed annual precipitation in the regional model and 59%, 60%, and 47% and 35% in the nested models. The two reconstructions are highly correlated (Pearson's correlation r > 0.97, p < 0.001) demonstrating that the reconstructions are highly similar over the period common to both reconstructions, with the nested-model's advantage of extending the range of the reconstruction. The precipitation reconstructions are significantly correlated (r = 0.66, p < 0.001) with the North American Drought Atlas (NADA).