Effect of changing vegetation and precipitation on denudation (part 1): Predicted vegetation composition and cover over the last 21 thousand years along the Coastal Cordillera of Chile Christian Werner1, Manuel Schmid2, Todd A Ehlers2, Juan Pablo Fuentes-Espoz3, Jörg Steinkamp1, 5 Matthew Forrest1, Johan Liakka4, Antonio Maldonado5, Thomas Hickler1,6 1 Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre (SBiK-F), Senckenberganlage 25, 60325 Frankfurt, Germany 2 University of Tuebingen, Department of Geosciences, Wilhelmstrasse 56, 72074 Tuebingen, Germany 3 Department of Silviculture and Nature Conservation, University of Chile, Av. Santa Rosa 11315, La Pintana, Santiago RM, Chile 10 4 Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center, Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, Thormøhlens gate 47, N-5006 Bergen, Norway 5 Centro de Estudios Avanzados en Zonas Áridas (CEAZA), Raúl Bitrán 1305, La Serena, Chile 6 Department of Physical Geography, Geosciences, Goethe-University, Altenhoeferallee 1, 60438 Frankfurt, Germany 15 Correspondence to: Christian Werner (
[email protected]) Abstract Vegetation is crucial for modulating rates of denudation and landscape evolution as it stabilizes and protects hillslopes and intercepts rainfall. Climate conditions and atmospheric CO2 concentration ([CO2]) influence the establishment and performance of plants and thus have a direct influence on vegetation cover. In addition, vegetation dynamics (competition 20 for space, light, nutrients and water) and stochastic events (mortality and fires) determine the state of vegetation, response times to environmental perturbations, and the successional development. In spite of this, state-of-art reconstructions of past transient vegetation changes have not been accounted for in landscape evolution models. Here, a widely used dynamic vegetation model (LPJ-GUESS) was used to simulate vegetation composition/ cover and surface runoff in Chile for the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), Mid Holocene (MH) and present day (PD).