Abstract
Late Pleistocene sedimentary deposits outcropping around Valdivia city, locally known as Cancagua, have been subject of contrasting interpretations, from glacial to interglacial sediments. Opposing views emerge from focusing on upstream or coastal sedimentary controls, within a zone were these potentially overlap through a full glacial cycle. Here we present the first detailed facies analysis and a broad chronological framework, reconciling previous interpretations in a single paleogeographic model that encompasses the last glacial cycle. Seven facies associations are described, interpreted as an estuarine complex developed primarily during the last glacial cycle’s highstand, yet accumulating sediments during a substantial part of the falling stage. These results offer the opportunity to extend paleoenvironmental records through a full glacial cycle in northern Patagonia.
Highlights
Understanding past climate changes and landscape response are essential for assessing the impact and outcomes of industrial society on the environment, and on itself
This paper focuses on late Pleistocene coastal sedimentary deposits outcropping around Valdivia city (39°50”S), connected to the fluvial system that drained the northernmost piedmont glacier lobes of the Patagonian Ice Sheet (PIS), as a first step toward reconstructing landscape response to glacial-interglacial cycles in South America
The late Pleistocene sedimentary rock sequence outcropping around Valdivia city, locally known as Cancagua, represents the last interglacial highstand prism
Summary
Understanding past climate changes and landscape response are essential for assessing the impact and outcomes of industrial society on the environment, and on itself. Data has proven indispensable for testing climate models, discussing connections and possible driving mechanisms governing climate change (e.g., Denton et al, 2010), as well as obtaining detailed records of climate variability suitable for comparison with modern data (e.g., De Batist et al, 2008; Heirman et al, 2011) Most of this effort has focused on the last glacial maximum (LGM) and Holocene (e.g., García et al, 2012; Moreno et al, 2014; Strelin et al, 2014), in part because of the abrupt character of this transition, and because detailed records, such as those preserved in peat bogs and lake sediments, began to accumulate after glacier withdrawal. This paper focuses on late Pleistocene coastal sedimentary deposits outcropping around Valdivia city (39°50”S), connected to the fluvial system that drained the northernmost piedmont glacier lobes of the PIS, as a first step toward reconstructing landscape response to glacial-interglacial cycles in South America
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