400 YEARS OF CENTRAL CALIFORNIA PRECIPITATION VARIABILITY RECONSTRUCTED FROM TREE‐RINGS¹

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Coastal central California is a region that has never been the subject of tree‐ring studies. New tree‐ring chronologies developed from cores of big cone spruce ( Pseudotusuga macrocarpa (Torr.) Mayr.) growing in the Transverse Ranges of central Santa Barbara county were used to reconstruct precipitation fluctuations for this region. To verify the new reconstructions, calibration with recorded rainfall using cross‐validation, comparison with other reconstructions, and documentary evidence from historical sources were utilized. The precipitation reconstructions show that there have not been fluctuations in mean precipitation on time scales longer than 30 years, but there have been major fluctuations in precipitation variability including changes in the frequency of extremes and rare events that have not occurred in the modern record.