The paper shows that historical records of wine yield and quality from Central Europe (1416–1988) can be combined into a Yield Quality Index (YQI). This index serves as a reliable indicator of climate conditions from May to July. Using long-term tax, tithe, and estate records from the Moselle region in Germany and the Swiss Plateau, the study shows that high YQI values correspond to warm summers, early harvests, and supportive tree-ring evidence. Conversely, low values often reflect cold summers or frost damage. These results confirm that wine production data can significantly improve climate reconstructions and help explain the social and economic impacts of past climate extremes.

After a discussion among the co-editors-in-chief of Climate of the Past, we decided to support the handling editor's proposal to highlight this paper. Based on measurements of iron, acidity, and conductivity from the EGRIP ice core, the study suggests that the iron hypothesis may be less effective than previously thought in the Northern Hemisphere, particularly in the Fe-limited North Pacific Ocean. Despite a strong increase in total atmospheric iron deposition, the fraction of iron more likely to be available to phytoplankton increased only modestly. The findings suggest that other factors, such as sea-ice extent or iron remobilization from sediments, may have played a more relevant role than atmospheric iron deposition in regulating marine primary productivity during the last glacial transition. denis-didier Rousseau on behalf of CP leadership

The manuscript by Herzschuh et al. presents a novel approach for deriving quantitative summer temperature estimates from Lake sediments. This method has the potential to substantially improve terrestrial temperature reconstructions and thereby advance our understanding of past continental climate change.

This manuscript introduces an innovative method for identifying cryptotephra in Antarctic ice cores, which could lead to significant new findings at Mount Brown South (MBS) and throughout Antarctica. The manuscript describes the identification of two new cryptotephra horizons in the MBS ice core from Wilhelm II Land in Antarctica. These cryptotephra originate from the mid-1980s eruptive period of Mt. Erebus and the cataclysmic 1991 eruption of Cerro Hudson. These two tephra horizons are an important addition to the East Antarctic tephrochronological framework. The findings of this study challenge previous assumptions about transport trajectories and pathways and satellite-era ice core chronologies, offering new insights into atmospheric circulation dynamics.