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Evidence of Younger Dryas and Neoglacial cooling in a Late Quaternary palaeotemperature record from a speleothem in eastern Victoria, Australia
Author(s) -
Goede Albert,
McDermott Frank,
Hawkesworth Chris,
Webb John,
Finlayson Brian
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
journal of quaternary science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.142
H-Index - 94
eISSN - 1099-1417
pISSN - 0267-8179
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1099-1417(199601/02)11:1<1::aid-jqs219>3.0.co;2-2
Subject(s) - younger dryas , stalagmite , speleothem , geology , quaternary , holocene , physical geography , glacial period , cave , climatology , paleontology , archaeology , geography
A calcitic stalagmite collected from a limestone cave in the Buchan area of eastern Victoria has been dated by three mass‐spectrometric uranium series analyses. Two growth phases are represented: the older from 13.4 to 10.6 ka and the younger from 3.2 to 2.1 ka. Oxygen isotope analysis reveals that temperatures were below present‐day values at all times, but particularly cool conditions are indicated between 12.3 and 11.4 ka, and Neoglacial conditions occurred at about 3 ka. The older cold climate event is clearly synchronous with the Younger Dryas in Europe and this is the first time that strong evidence for this event has been found in Australia. Carbon isotope variations are interpreted as indicating changes in plant productivity on the surface and are most likely controlled by variations in summer rainfall. They indicate particularly high levels of plant productivity from 11.5 to 11.0 ka. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.