| Available proxy records witnessing palaeoclimate of the tropical Andes are
comparably scarce. Major implications of palaeoclimate development in the
humid and arid parts of the Andes are briefly summarized. The long-term
behaviour of ENSO has general significance for the climatic history of the
Andes due to its impact on regional circulation patterns and precipitation
regimes, therefore ENSO history derived from non-Andean palaeo-records is
highlighted. Methodological constraints of the chronological precision and
the palaeoclimatic interpretation of records derived from different natural
archives, such as glacier sediments and ice cores, lake sediments and
palaeo-wetlands, pollen profiles and tree rings are addressed and
complementary results concerning former climatic conditions are discussed in
terms of possible implications of former atmospheric circulation patterns
and main climatic forcing factors. During the last years, increasing
tree-ring information is getting available from the tropical Andes,
providing high-resolution climate-sensitive records covering the past
centuries for the study of climate variability. |