NOAA Paleoclimatology Program - Biondi et al. Tree Ring PDO Reconstruction

Fig. 5 (below) PDO-ENSO patterns from 1706 to 1977, obtained by adding the proxy PDO record (Fig. 3) with a proxy record of winter Southern Oscillation Index derived by Stahle et al. (1998) Both series were first converted to standard deviation units, and the sign of the SOI was reversed to make El Nino years positive. Absolute values are higher (lower) during constructive (destructive) interference between PDO and ENSO.

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National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
12 Jan 2001

North Pacific Decadal Climate Variability Since AD 1661

	North Pacific Decadal Climate Variability Since AD 1661 Journal of Climate, Volume 14, Number 1, pp. 5-10, January 2001. Franco Biondi Department of Geography, University of Nevada. Alexander Gershunov Scripps Institute of Oceanography Daniel R. Cayan Scripps Institute of Oceanography and US Geological Survey

ABSTRACT:
Climate in the North Pacific and North American sectors has experienced interdecadal shifts during the 20th century. A network of recently developed tree-ring chronologies for Southern and Baja California extends the instrumental record, and reveals decadal-scale variability back to AD 1661. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is closely matched by the dominant mode of tree-ring variability, which provides a preliminary view of multi-annual climate fluctuations spanning the past four centuries. The reconstructed PDO index features a prominent bidecadal oscillation, whose amplitude weakened in the late 1700s to mid-1800s. A comparison with proxy records of ENSO suggests that the greatest decadal-scale oscillations in Pacific climate between 1706 and 1977 occurred around 1750, 1905, and 1947.

DATA:
Download the Reconstructed PDO time series and
description from the WDC Paleo Archive.

Download the tree-ring data used in this study:
(Available upon publication).
Jeffrey Pine sites (stars):
Fish Creek Trail (San Gorgonio) Chronology and measurements
La Tasajera (San Pedro Martir) Chronology and measurements
Mt. Laguna Chronology and measurements

Big-cone Douglas-fir sites (squares):
Fry Creek (Palomar Mt.) Chronology and measurements
Pine Mountain North Chronology and measurements
Santa Ana Mountains Chronology and measurements

To read or view the full study, please visit the American Meteorological Society website.
It was published in Journal of Climate Volume 14, Number 1, pp. 5-10, January 2001.


Fig. 2 (upper) Interdecadal variability of tree-ring chronologies closely matches the PDO since about 1925, especially with regard to the major reversals in 1947 and 1977 (dashed vertical lines). Fig. 2 (lower) At decadal scales, the leading mode of tree-ring variability (PC1, dotted) well represents PDO patterns (solid).		Fig.3 Reconstructed PDO since 1660. Correlation between instrumental (dashed) and reconstructed PDO is 0.64 from 1925 to 1991. During warm periods, the eastern North Pacific is warmer than usual, and the central North Pacific is cooler (viceversa during cool periods). Warm and cool PDO phases are qualitatively similar to warm and cool ENSO events, but different because of slower temporal dynamics and stronger midlatitudinal responses.

Fig. 4A. (above left) In the common period 1900-1991, the instrumental and reconstructed PDO are spectrally coherent in the bidecadal band.

Fig 4B. (above right) The two leading eigenfunctions (EOFs) of reconstructed PDO form an oscillatory pair (thick line: first EFO) that accounts for 28.5% of variance. The combined amplitude of those two components has a ~23 year period, and represents the time-varying strength of the bidecadal oscillation.

Fig 4C. (below) Evolutive spectrum of reconstructed PDO, showing a prominent bidecadal mode whose strength was less intense from the late 1700s to the mid-1800s. Lower frequencies (from multidecadal to centennial and longer) in the PDO time series are restricted to the twentieth century.