A SIMPLE METHOD FOR CROSS-DATING INCREMENT CORES FROM LIVING TREES

For many types of forest studies, it is essential to identify the exact years of formation of annual rings in increment cores taken from living trees. To accomplish this, dendrochronologists employ cross dating, which involves both ring counting and ring-width pattern matching, to ensure against counting error, or errors, caused by missing or false rings. To date, published accounts of the cross-dating process generally describe a graphical method for achieving cross dating, known as skeleton plotting. However, when working with cores from living trees, skeleton plotting is seldom necessary. Such cores can commonly be cross-dated more quickly and easily by listing the narrow rings that are present in each core in a laboratory notebook and then comparing core notes for shared narrow rings. The latter approach permits faster recognition of ring-width patterns because calendar-year, rather than relative-year, dates are assigned to rings in cores. It also allows cross-dating records to be stored in a more concise manner.