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Integrating Stalagmite, Vertebrate, and Pollen Sequences to Investigate Holocene Vegetation and Climate Change in the Southern Midwestern United States

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Rhawn F. Denniston ,
Luis A. Gonzalez ,
Holmes A. Semken Jr. ,
Yemane Asmerom ,
Richard G. Baker ,
Heather Recelli-Snyder ,
Mark K. Reagan  and
E. Arthur Bettis III
Rhawn F. Denniston
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
Luis A. Gonzalez
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
Holmes A. Semken Jr.
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
Yemane Asmerom
Affiliation:
Department of Earth & Planetary Science, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87131
Richard G. Baker
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
Heather Recelli-Snyder
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
Mark K. Reagan
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
E. Arthur Bettis III
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 52242, Email: rhawn-denniston@uiowa.edu
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Abstract

Speleothem carbon and oxygen isotopic records from Onondaga Cave, south-central Missouri, and Beckham Creek Cave, north-central Arkansas, are compared with the Cupola Pond and Oldfield Swamp pollen series from southeastern Missouri and the Rodgers Shelter and Modoc Shelter vertebrate biostratigraphic sequences from central Missouri and southwestern Illinois. Similar, and roughly contemporaneous, shifts between deciduous forest and steppe indicators throughout the Holocene are revealed in each database. These independent proxies record steppe conditions between approximately 9000 and 1500 cal yr B.P. A shift toward lighter speleothem carbon may reflect a change from warm and dry to cool and dry conditions between 4500 and 3000 yr B.P. The sensitive response of speleothem δ13C to changes in vegetation emphasizes their importance as paleoclimate records in an area containing few other millenial-scale climate proxies.

Keywords

speleothemvertebratespollenpaleoclimateHoloceneMidwest
Type
Research Article
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 52 , Issue 3 , November 1999 , pp. 381 - 387
Copyright
University of Washington

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