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Early Holocene Vegetation Record from the Salton Basin, California

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Roberta B. Rinehart  and
Donald A. McFarlane
Roberta B. Rinehart
Affiliation:
Joint Science Department, W. M. Keck Science Center, The Claremont Colleges, 925 North Mills Avenue, Claremont, California 91711-5916
Donald A. McFarlane
Affiliation:
Joint Science Department, W. M. Keck Science Center, The Claremont Colleges, 925 North Mills Avenue, Claremont, California 91711-5916
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Abstract

Plant and vertebrate macrofossils in an early Holocene fossil packrat (Neotoma sp.) midden with a radiocarbon age of 8640 ± 100 14C yr B.P. are reported from the Chocolate Mountains, near the Salton Sea, Riverside County, California. An inventory of the midden has permitted a comparison of the modern flora and fauna of the site with that extant during the early Holocene. Whereas the biota had assumed most aspects of its modern Sonoran desert aspect by this date, statistically significant evidence of differences is attributed to an increased flow of surface water in Salt Creek, a high-standing, low-salinity Lake LeConte, and the late arrival of some characteristic Sonoran desert plants. These observations are consistent with models of significant fall-winter precipitation in the Sonoran Desert, although we cannot exclude alternative explanations.

Type
Short Paper
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 43 , Issue 2 , March 1995 , pp. 259 - 262
Copyright
University of Washington

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