Evidence for Younger Dryas-age cooling on the North Pacific coast of America

Abstract

A review of the palynological evidence from the Olympic Peninsula of Washington State north to the Alaska Panhandle strongly supports the existence of a climatic oscillation similar in timing and effect to the Younger Dryas cooling (11-10 ka BP) of Europe and eastern North America. The evidence includes many late-glacial pollen peaks of mountain hemlock ( Tsuga mertensiana), an indicator of cool and moist climate, reversals from forest to non-arboreal vegetation, and paleoclimate analysis using pollen-climate transfer functions on the Queen Charlotte Islands. Evidence of cooler ocean waters, based on fossil foraminifera in cores from the continental shelf, also supports an interpretation of a Younger Dryas-age climatic reversal. On the other hand, geological evidence of glacier readvances during the Younger Dryas chronozone is weak and poorly dated. Although more and better-constrained (AMS) dates are needed to confirm the timing of the Pacific Northwest cold oscillation, results so far point to maximum cooling and increased moisture between ca. 10.7-10 ka BP, followed by rapid warming in the early Holocene. Additional late-glacial sites need to be investigated in detail to confirm the geographical pattern of vegetation and climate change during this interval, which is best expressed in hypermaritime and maritime climate regions, similar to the Younger Dryas event around the North Atlantic. These results suggest that the search for causal mechanisms to drive the Younger Dryas cooling cannot be limited to events in the North Atlantic region, but should focus on possible hemispheric or global processes.