Northern peatlands act as archives of environmental change through their sensitivity to water balance fluctuations, while being significant contributors to global greenhouse gas dynamics. Subarctic fens in north‐eastern Canada are characterized by a dominance of pools and flarks. We aimed to reconstruct the late Holocene hydrological conditions of these fens to establish the timing of the initiation of pool and flark formation...

We analysed charcoal and pollen from sediments obtained from two lakes in the northwestern mixed‐wood Canadian boreal forest in order to reconstruct fire‐return intervals and vegetation dynamics over the last 8000 years. Sites were selected with contrasting soil properties (mesic versus dry‐sandy soils), allowing an estimation of the potential influence of soils on long‐term vegetation and fire dynamics. The sites likely exper...