Archipelagos in the Anthropocene - the legacies of past human-environment interactions on islands
Sietze Norder  1, 2@  , Ricardo F. De Lima  3  , José Maria Fernandez-Palacios  4  , Lea De Nascimento  4, 5  , Maria Romeiras  6  , Rui Elias  7  , Luís Catarino  3  , Luis Ceríaco  8, 9  , Rosalina Gabriel  7  , Miguel Menezes De Sequeira  10  , Sandra Nogué  11  , Margarida Matos  3  , Kenneth Rijsdijk  12  , Marcus Hall  13  , Paulo A.v. Borges  7  
1 : Centre for Ecology - Evolution and Environmental Changes / Azorean Biodiversity Group  (cE3c)
Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade de Lisboa, 1749-016, Lisboa -  Portugal
2 : Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics / Biogeography and Macroecology group  (IBED / BIOMAC)
University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, 1090 GE, Amsterdam -  Netherlands
3 : Centre for Ecology - Evolution and Environmental Changes  (cE3c)
Faculdade de Ciências -  Portugal
4 : Universidad de La Laguna [Tenerife - SP]  (ULL)
S/C de Tenerife Spain -  Spain
5 : Landcare Research
Lincoln 7640 -  New Zealand
6 : Instituto Superior de Agronomia / Facultade de Ciencias
Universidade de Lisboa Campo Grande 1749-016 Lisboa -  Portugal
7 : Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Changes (cE3c)/Azorean Biodiversity Group  (cE3c)
Universidade dos Açores– Depto. de Ciências e Engenharia do Ambiente, Angra do Heroísmo, Açores -  Portugal
8 : Villanova University [Philadelphie]
800 E. Lancaster AvenueVillanova, PA 19085USA -  United States
9 : Museu Nacional de História Natural e da Ciência  (MUHNAC)
Rua da Escola Politécnica 58, 1250-102 Lisboa -  Portugal
10 : University of Madeira [Funchal]
Campus Universitário da Penteada 9000-390 Funchal -  Portugal
11 : University of Southhampton
University Road, Southampton SO17 1BJ -  United Kingdom
12 : Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics  (IBED)
Kruislaan 318, 1098 SM Amsterdam -  Netherlands
13 : University of Zürich [Zürich]  (UZH)
Rämistrasse 71CH-8006 Zürich -  Switzerland

Human activities fundamentally alter ecosystems and landscapes from local to global scales. A key moment in making human impact truly global was the arrival of Columbus to the Americas in the late 15th century. The islands in the eastern Atlantic Ocean were crucial stepping-stones for this event and allowed for the subsequent emergence of global trade networks. These islands facilitated the biotic and cultural exchanges in the current epoch and as such, played a crucial role in the start of the Anthropocene. The aim of our study is to understand to what extent past human-environment interactions have shaped present-day landscapes and ecosystems on 30 islands in the eastern Atlantic. Volcanic oceanic islands are ideal “microcosms” for analysing the dynamics of past human impacts because the start of ecological processes and first human contact can be clearly defined. We integrate palaeo-ecological- and historical socioeconomic data spanning the duration of human settlement with a GIS-based analysis of anthropogenic, climatic and topographic variables. As a proxy for the state of island ecosystems and landscapes, we quantified the proportion of natural vegetation and calculated an index for the degree of landscape modification. Our findings show that present-day ecosystems and landscapes are the outcome of how humans have interacted with their environment over several centuries and sometimes millennia. However, contrasting pathways of past human-environment interactions result in diverse ecological and landscape outcomes. We conclude that an appreciation of the dynamics of local human-landscape interactions in the past provides a reference point for understanding current global change.



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