Latest Pleistocene glacier advances and post-Younger Dryas rock glacier stabilization in the Mt. Kriváň group, High Tatra Mountains, Slovakia

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The timing of glacier disappearance and rock glacier stabilization in the highest massifs of the Carpathians is still poorly documented. In this paper, we establish the extent and chronology of the final stages of glaciation and timing of stabilization of the uppermost rock glaciers in the Tatra Mountains, which are the highest (2654 m a.s.l.), northernmost (N 49°12′), and coldest range in the Carpathians. On the base of morphostratigraphic principles, Schmidt Hammer tests and glacier equilibrium line altitude (ELA) estimation, we assigned moraines and rock glaciers in the Mt. Kriváň massif (SW part of High Tatras) to a threefold stratigraphic sequence with glacial stages/advances from older to younger: Popradské pleso (Pp), Suchá važecká I (Sv I) and Suchá važecká II (Sv II). Landforms attributed to two younger advances, Sv I and Sv II, were sampled for the purpose of cosmogenic 10Be surface exposure dating. Our data show that Pp and Sv I glacial advances occurred during the Oldest Dryas climatic downturn. The younger advance (Sv I) occurred just before the Bølling-Allerød (B/A) warming at 14.9 ± 0.4 ka, at this time small glaciers occupied lower glacial cirques in the study area. The youngest Sv II advance was characterized by rock glaciers and small debris-covered glaciers confined to the highest cirques. The mean exposure age of four relict rock glaciers of this stage is 11.1 ± 0.9 ka but individual rock glacier mean ages spanned between 11.8 and 10.4 ka. Our research results show that the youngest moraines and rock glaciers in the Tatra Mountains were formed during the Younger Dryas (YD), but the final permafrost melting and rock glacier stabilization period was delayed until the early Holocene, but no later than 10.4 ka. In high elevation cirque bottoms (up to 2120 m a.s.l.), the YD glaciers and rock glaciers readvanced across land which was ice-free as early as 14.8–14.2 ka. Thus, it is likely that during the B/A interphase, glaciers completely disappeared in the Tatra Mountains. The YD was the last period of glacial/periglacial activity in the massif. As we investigated one of the highest-situated rock glaciers in the Tatras (up to 2220 m a.s.l.), we conclude that all rock glaciers in this massif are relict landforms which developed in response to severe Lateglacial climate conditions. The Lateglacial climate of the Tatra Mountains is discussed herein on the basis of glacier equilibrium line altitude (ELA) estimation and the vertical distribution of rock glacier belts. We argue that paleoclimate significance of the presented geomorphological record may match paleobotanical proxy reconstructions and the results of climate simulations, but only if the impact of enhanced temperature seasonality on glacier mass balance and rock glacier activity is taken into account.