Mackenzie River Driftwood: A Dendrochronological Study

Abstract

As part of a general study of arctic driftwood, 206 samples of driftwood logs from the Mackenzie delta area were analyzed by dendrochronological methods (tree-ring studies). The aim was to detect the origin of the wood. Three forest stands in the delta were also sampled, and tree-ring chronologies were constructed. The Mackenzie driftwood can be divided into four groups: 1) driftwood originating from the upper Mackenzie delta with individual logs having up to 600 tree rings, 2) driftwood originating near the southern limit of the delta, 3) wood with relatively few tree rings with possible origin in the Liard River drainage area, and 4) driftwood samples not datable with any available chronologies. Three driftwood samples from the coast of Greenland could be correlated with tree-ring chronologies from the Mackenzie delta area and another three were correlated with chronologies from Alaska. American driftwood has not been detected in collections from Svalbard and Iceland, although more than 200 samples have been analyzed from each area.

Key words: Mackenzie River, driftwod, dendrochronology, Arctic Ocean, East Greenland Current, surface currents, drift ice, Canada, Alaska