Most studies of alpine glacial history have concentrated on terminal moraines, but such moraines provide dates only for maximum extents of glaciers. Some lateral moraines have the potential for providing more complete glacial histories, because deposition by distal-flank accretion may result in sequences of stacked tills. Interpretation is aided by (1) the approximation that any continuous surface within the moraine parallel to the moraine's distal flank is isochronous, (2) inset gulley-fill deposits, which provide information on ice-margin history, and (3) incorporated organic material which can be radiocarbon dated. Lateral moraine stratigraphy of Bugaboo Glacier in southeastern British Columbia suggests that the glacier was fairly close to its maximum Neoglacial extent about 2500 14C yr B.P. A slow general expansion punctuated by at least one minor retreat continued from that time and culminated probably in the last century.

Groundwater from the Ojo Alamo and Nacimiento aquifers in the central San Juan Basin. New Mexico, has yielded 14C ages ranging from modern to 35,000 yr B.P. The Pleistocene-age samples are characterized by a stable isotope content about 25‰ lighter in D and 3‰ lighter in 18O than modern precipitation and groundwater. We attribute this difference to a colder mean annual temperature and perhaps increased winter precipitation. Consideration of various factors controlling the stable isotope composition of the groundwater allows estimation of a 5° to 7°C temperature decrease during the late Wisconsin, accompanied by increased effective precipitation. A similar estimate of the temperature change is obtained from noble-gas paleothermometry. These data support a model of moderately cooler late Pleistocene climate in the American Southwest characterized by summers with less precipitation than today, but wetter winters.

The constructive phase of the modern Nile Delta, as manifested in a 48-m section drilled east of the Suez Canal, commenced in very early Holocene times. Sands rich in marine fauna were deposited in the littoral zone and the shoreline was more than 20 km landward of its present-day position. Subsequently, clays and silts were dumped from the Nile distributaries and the marine faunal spectrum became very limited and brackish. Later in early and middle Holocene times the sediments deposited were rich in freshwater, delta-plain diatoms and pollen and in allochthonous fern spores from the tropics, indicating proximity of a distributary mouth. The middle part of the section (22.5-17.5 m) is very poor in faunal and floral remains; pollen grains from sabkha vegetation are abundant. The environment, which seems lagoonal and slightly hypersaline, is related to the sea regression in middle Holocene times. Euryhaline pelecypods, dating from about 3000 yr B.P., are abundant around the 8-m depth. Upward, there is an increase in pollen grains from sabkhas; the section is poor in diatoms and those present are mostly euryhaline and lagoonal. Allochthonous spores derived from the nearby Pelusiac Branch are abundant. Between 3000 and 2000 yr B.P. the constructive phase of the modern delta terminated and winnowed sands began accreting in front of the delta plain.

Pleistocene areas of red sediments and carbonized vegetation on the Northern Channel Islands, California, have in the past been interpreted as caused by fires of either natural or human origin. Some are associated with darkened mammoth and bird fossils, and these fossils have been considered as having been burned by early man. Reevaluation of these so-called “fire areas” indicates that the above phenomena are the result of low-temperature (≤100°C), nonheating processes occurring in groundwater. Evidence for this conclusion is derived from field observations on fossil carbonized vegetation, and the geology of the areas. Additional evidence derives from experiments on the red sediments and fossil wood, X-ray diffraction analyses, magnetic analyses, studies on the clay minerals smectite and illite, and the demonstration that fossil mammoth bone contains sufficient Fe and Mn to account for their discoloration. Much of the carbonization of vegetation probably occurred in water rather than in fire. Radiocarbon dates from the islands will probably need to be reevaluated. These data provide evidence contrary to the concept of the occurrence of significant fires, either natural or set by early man, on the Northern Channel Islands.

Bottom sediments from three lakes in the Canadian Rocky Mountains were examined with the aim of evaluating the usefulness of downvalley sediment studies in reconstruction of Holocene glacial histories. Analyses of organic carbon and carbonate contents of core sediments provide information on changing sedimentation rate and changing relative importance of glacial and non-glacial sediment sources. Sedimentary histories of the three lakes are similar, suggesting that they record regional glacial/climatic forcing, rather than localized events, and thus that they may be useful in reconstructing Holocene glacial history. Lacustrine sediments indicate a period of high sedimentation rates and relatively large glacial sediment contribution prior to 7500-7000 yr B.P., with much reduced rates and decreased glacial sediment contribution between about 6000 and 4000 yr B.P., possibly interrupted by a brief period of increased glacial sediment output shortly after 5000 yr B.P. Sometime after 4000 yr B.P., sedimentation rates and glacial sediment output began to rise again, reaching approximately present levels by 2750-2650 yr B.P., and have not since returned to low mid-Holocene levels. In detail over the last 3000 yr there is some indication of a slight decrease in sedimentation rate for more than 1000 yr after about 2200 yr B.P. Sedimentation rates and glacial sediment input into all three lakes rose between about 900 and 750 yr B.P. and have remained very high since. If the lake sediments are interpreted as a proxy record of upvalley glacial activity, they allow the development of a glacial chronology which is at once generally consistent with, and more complete and easily datable than, the surficial glacial record.

Dendroclimatological studies in eastern North America are enhanced by the use of long-time series of maximum latewood densities determined by x-ray densitometry. The densities show higher correlation from tree to tree and site to site than do ring-width measurements from the same trees. Based on the macroclimatic link thus implied, maximum density and width series of Picea rubens Sarg. from high elevations in Maine are used to reconstruct up to 310 yr of past spring temperatures at nearby climate stations. The regression equations explain from 33 to 47% of calibrated variance, and verification testing of the reconstructions produces highly significant correlations and high, positive reduction of error statistics. The climate-wood density relationships are considered in light of tree physiological factors that may explain them. Results from this study are applicable to (1) an increased understanding of the relationship of climate to the formation of wood density and (2) further development of paleoclimatological and paleoenvironmental studies via tree rings in mesic regions such as northeastern North America.

Pollen, macrofossil (logs and needles), and oxygen-isotope data from tree rings are presented for three alpine bog sites in the Maligne Range of the Canadian Rockies. Organic sedimentation at the Watchtower site began prior to ca. 9500 14C yr B.P. and by 8770 yr B.P. timberlines were at least 100 m above present levels. The two pollen records are dominated by Pinus and subsequent changes in timberlines are inferred from pollen-ratio data (Abies/Pinus) and from macrofossils. The recovered records indicate two periods of high Hypsithermal timberlines ca. 8800-7500 and 7200-5200 yr B.P. separated by a short interval ca. 7300–7400 yr B.P. when timberline approached modern levels. After ca. 4500 yr B.P. timberlines have been similar to or lower than present, reaching minimum values in the last 500 yr. δ18O determinations from the α-cellulose of samples of 5 or 10 annual rings cut from contemporary Picea englemannii at timberline show strong correlations with mean annual temperatures at Jasper. Isotopic determinations from Hypsithermal-age logs recovered from sites above present timberline indicate mean annual temperatures were at least 0.5°C warmer ca. 8060 and 8770 yr B.P. than at present at the Watchtower site. Data from logs at the Maligne Pass site suggest that temperatures were about 1.2° and 1.6°C warmer ca. 6000 and 5300 yr B.P. Estimates of temperature from the pollen-ratio data are more conservative and suggest maximum differences of ca. 1.0°C in July temperatures over the last 8000 yr.

Radiocarbon datings of the Saksunarvatn ash bed on the Faroe Islands indicate an age of 9000–9100 yr B.P. The Saksunarvatn ash bed differs geochemically from both ash zone 1 in the North Atlantic and the Vedde Ash Bed of Norway and the Norwegian Sea. All mentioned ashes are assumed to originate from Iceland. The Vedde Ash has been dated at 10,600 ± 60 yr B.P. Consequently, the Saksunarvatn and Vedde ash beds provide an opportunity for precise dating of events around the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary in marine cores, especially from the region where the two plumes overlap.

The gomphothere, Stegomastodon, is the most morphologically progressive non-elephant proboscidean in North America. Prior to the appearance of mammoths during the earliest Pleistocene, stegomastodonts held niches later occupied by those elephants. Two proboscidean specimens from near Taylor, Arizona, show that elephant-like Stegomastodon coexisted with Mammuthus in the southwestern United States during the Quaternary. Other associations of Stegomastodon and Mammuthus are known from the early and middle Pleistocene of Texas and the early Pleistocene of Nebraska. The mammoth from the Taylor locality is the oldest known from Arizona.

Light rings are characterized by one or a very few latewood-cell layers, an indication of shortened growing seasons, and are particularly frequent in black spruce (Picea mariana (Mill.) BSP) at the treeline in Québec. The construction of a light-ring chronology spanning the period AD 1398–1982 showed that the highest frequency (>25%) of light rings among 160 trees and krummholz occurred in 1593, 1620, 1634, 1784, 1816, 1817, 1853, 1969, and 1972. These diagnostic rings be a useful cross-dating tool for dendroecologists working with living and dead krummholz with a low-growth variability. About two-thirds of the 65 light-ring years coincide with years (or triads) of major volcanic eruptions. The climatic conditions (low temperature) occurring at the end of the growing season, in part induced by the climatic effect of volcanism, seem to initiate light rings.