scholarly journals The Quaternary History of Cumberland Sound, Southeastern Baffin Island: The Marine Evidence

2007 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne E. Jennings

ABSTRACTAcoustic and core data from Cumberland Sound show that glacial ice derived from the Foxe Sector (Amadjuak Dome) of the Laurentide Ice Sheet advanced to the continental shelf at the mouth of the sound during a late phase of the Foxe Glaciation. The basal lithofacies/acoustic unit (Ai/BUD) in the sound is a massive, black diamicton. On the basis of strati-graphic, acoustic, lithologie and faunal evidence, this unit is interpreted as till. The till is overlain by an ice proximal to ice distal glacial-marine sediment sequence termed the Davis Strait Silt (DSS). The influence of ice retreat is reflected in the foraminiferal assemblages of the DSS. Rapid sedimentation rates in the sound prevailed during deposition of the DSS as shown by the conformable geometry of the DSS. Accelerator Mass Spectrometry dates on molluscs and foraminifera and a single conventional 14C date on disseminated organic material from ice proximal sediment of the DSS (lithofacies B and lower lithofacies C) indicate that the ice retreated rapidly from its probable maximum position on the shelf no earlier than ca. 13,400 BP and into the fiords along the coast of the sound by ca. 8900 BP. Deposition of ice-distal glacial marine sediments (lower lithofacies D) continued in the sound until ca. 7600 BP as the ice margin rapidly retreated into the fiords. Between ca. 8900 BP and ca. 8000 BP, the foraminiferal fauna show that the influence of glacial ice is remote and that "Atlantic Water" impinges on the seafloor. Postglacial sedimentation began in the sound at ca. 7600 BP. Retreat of the ice margin onto land made the fiord basins available as sediment catchments. The reduced sedimentation rates in the sound during this interval are indicated by the change to onlapping basin fill geometry of the Tiniktartuq Silt and Clay (TS&C). Calcareous foraminifera disappear from the sediments by ca. 6300 BP and are replaced by agglutinated foraminifera reflecting "Arctic Water" conditions at the seafloor. The TS&C is presently being deposited in the sound.

2002 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 409-419 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Allan James ◽  
Jon Harbor ◽  
Derek Fabel ◽  
Dennis Dahms ◽  
David Elmore

AbstractPleistocene fluvial landforms and riparian ecosystems in central California responded to climate changes in the Sierra Nevada, yet the glacial history of the western Sierra remains largely unknown. Three glacial stages in the northwestern Sierra Nevada are documented by field mapping and cosmogenic radionuclide surface-exposure (CRSE) ages. Two CRSE ages of erratic boulders on an isolated till above Bear Valley provide a limiting minimum age of 76,400±3800 10Be yr. Another boulder age provides a limiting minimum age of 48,800±3200 10Be yr for a broad-crested moraine ridge within Bear Valley. Three CRSE ages producing an average age of 18,600±1180 yr were drawn from two boulders near a sharp-crested bouldery lateral moraine that represents an extensive Tioga glaciation in Bear Valley. Nine CRSE ages from striated bedrock along a steep valley transect average 14,100±1500 yr and suggest rapid late-glacial ice retreat from lower Fordyce Canyon with no subsequent extensive glaciations. These ages are generally consistent with glacial and pluvial records in east-central California and Nevada.


2006 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 57-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. G. Jones

AbstractRecent studies reveal an increasing number of instances in which Qallunaat benefited from Inuit knowledge of the lands and waters upon which they had lived for centuries. One of the best recorded examples of Inuit geographical knowledge is found in the story of Eenoolooapik, who led to the European rediscovery of Cumberland Sound 250 years after it was first explored and named by John Davis. Taken as a young man from Baffin Island to Scotland in 1839, Eenoolooapik excited whaling captain William Penny with stories of a large, whale-rich body of water then unknown to European and American whalers. “Eenoo,” as he was popularly called, drew a map of the coastline of eastern Baffin showing a deep bay known by the Inuit as “Tenudiackbeek,” and upon their return the next summer, Penny skeptically followed Eenoolooapik’s directions into a large bay in which the Inuk had spent his childhood. Thus the youngster’s geographical knowledge of his homeland resulted in the opening to whalers of a long-lost body of water in which, in the next decade, shore stations were established that offered seasonal employment to the Inuit and dramatically changed their lives. The story of Eenoolooapik is told in a small book by Alexander M’Donald,A Narrative of Some Passages in the History of Eenoolooapik[…] published in Edinburgh in 1841. This is probably the only nineteenth-century full-length biography of an Inuk published during the subject’s lifetime; and because copies of the book are exceedingly rare, the following article provides a synopsis as a means of portraying more fully the geographical contributions of Eenoolooapik.


1999 ◽  
Vol 36 (8) ◽  
pp. 1315-1326 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael R Kaplan ◽  
W Tad Pfeffer ◽  
Christophe Sassolas ◽  
Gifford H Miller

A numerical model reconstruction was made of the northeastern Laurentide Ice Sheet in the Baffin Island - Foxe Basin region using geophysical, terrestrial, and marine geologic evidence for initial and boundary conditions. The simulated ice sheet consists of a Foxe Dome with additional smaller Hall and Amadjuak domes and a Penny Ice Divide. A specific objective was to determine boundary conditions that would allow advance of a marine-based low surface slope ice stream into and out of Cumberland Sound, a major marine embayment in the uplifted rim of the eastern Canadian Arctic (up to 1200 m deep), while maintaining ice free or nonsliding (e.g., cold-based) thin ice on adjacent plateaus of Cumberland Peninsula; this scenario accommodates interpretations based on terrestrial and marine studies in this region. After an initial ice-sheet configuration is placed on the eastern Arctic terrain, basal sliding is allowed in specified regions. Basal sliding below sea level and between the Foxe Dome and Cumberland Sound and a reasonable but critical initial ice sheet volume and dome surface elevation are needed to obtain advance along and out of Cumberland Sound. Rapid flow into Hudson Strait and along Cumberland Sound causes drawdown and a change in ice-sheet configuration. Although more Foxe Dome ice flows into western Hudson Strait than Cumberland Sound in the simulations, the latter may still have been an important conduit connecting the interior of the northeastern Laurentide Ice Sheet to the Labrador Sea, thereby affecting regional ice sheet dynamics, specifically ice surface elevations and flow paths.


Author(s):  
Robert Deering ◽  
Trevor Bell ◽  
Donald L. Forbes

The Cockburn Substage readvance marks the last major late-glacial advance of the northeast sector of the Laurentide Ice Sheet on Baffin Island. The causes of this abrupt, late reversal of retreat are still unclear, but greater chronological control may provide some insight. To date, the literature has focused on the large terminal moraines in the region, providing a date of readvance (c. 9.5-8.5 ka cal BP). In Frobisher Bay, the Cockburn Substage readvance and recession onshore are marked by a series of moraines spread over ~20 km along the inner bay. Acoustic marine mapping reveals five distinct transverse ridges, morphologically suggestive of grounding-zone wedges, and two later fields of DeGeer moraines on the floor of the inner bay. These indicate that the style of ice retreat (beginning no later than 8.5 ka cal BP) changed over time from punctuated recession of a floating ice-front (20 km over >680 years, with four pauses) to more regular tidewater ice-front retreat, reaching the head of the bay 900 years or more after withdrawal from the outer Cockburn limit. The established chronology for final recession in the region is based largely on radiocarbon dating of bulk shell samples and single shells of deposit-feeding molluscs, notably <i>Portlandia arctica</i>, affected by old carbon from carbonate-rich sediments. Sedimentary analysis and judicious sampling for <sup>14</sup>C dating of glaciomarine and marine facies in seabed sediment cores enables development of a late- and postglacial lithostratigraphy that indicates final withdrawal of ice from the drainage basin by 7 ka cal BP.


2008 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur S. Dyke ◽  
Victor K. Prest

AbstractEleven paleogeographic maps and a summary ice retreat map outline the history of advance, retreat, and readvances of the Laurentide Ice Sheet along with associated changes in proglacial drainage and relative sea level oscillations for Late Wisconsinan and Holocene times. The text outlines pertinent chronological control and discusses the paleoglaciology of the ice sheet, with attention to location and migration of ice divides, their attendant domes and saddles, and to ice streams, ice shelves, and mechanisms of déglaciation. At 18 ka the ice sheet consisted of 3 sectors with an interlocked system of ice divides joined at intersector saddles. A throughgoing superdivide is recognized and named the Trans Laurentide Ice Divide. The ice sheet retreated slowly from 18 to 13 ka, mainly along the west and south margins, but still held a near maximum configuration at 13 ka. A regional change in flow pattern over the Prairies just before 14 ka is thought to represent a large reduction in ice volume, but not in extent, and likely was triggered by a switch from nondeforming to deforming bed conditions. Retreat between 13 and 8 ka was vastly more rapid in the west than in the east, which resulted in eastward migration of the divide system of Keewatin Ice but relatively static divides of Labrador and Foxe Ice. By 10 ka the Trans Laurentide Ice Divide had been fragmented as Hudson Ice became increasingly autonomous. By 8 ka Hudson Ice had disappeared, little ice was left in Keewatin, but Foxe Ice still held its near maximum configuration and Labrador Ice was still larger than Foxe Ice. Repeated surging along aquatic margins and calving back of margins thinned by surging probably was the most important mechanism of deglaciation of Keewatin and Hudson Ice. The core of Foxe Ice disintegrated at 7 ka but retreat and readvance of Foxe Ice remnants continued throughout the Holocene.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Jackson ◽  
Anna Bang Kvorning ◽  
Audrey Limoges ◽  
Eleanor Georgiadis ◽  
Steffen M. Olsen ◽  
...  

AbstractBaffin Bay hosts the largest and most productive of the Arctic polynyas: the North Water (NOW). Despite its significance and active role in water mass formation, the history of the NOW beyond the observational era remains poorly known. We reconcile the previously unassessed relationship between long-term NOW dynamics and ocean conditions by applying a multiproxy approach to two marine sediment cores from the region that, together, span the Holocene. Declining influence of Atlantic Water in the NOW is coeval with regional records that indicate the inception of a strong and recurrent polynya from ~ 4400 yrs BP, in line with Neoglacial cooling. During warmer Holocene intervals such as the Roman Warm Period, a weaker NOW is evident, and its reduced capacity to influence bottom ocean conditions facilitated northward penetration of Atlantic Water. Future warming in the Arctic may have negative consequences for this vital biological oasis, with the potential knock-on effect of warm water penetration further north and intensified melt of the marine-terminating glaciers that flank the coast of northwest Greenland.


Boreas ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 295-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOHN SHAW ◽  
DOUGLAS R. GRANT ◽  
JEAN-PIERRE GUILBAULT ◽  
THANE W. ANDERSON ◽  
D. RUSSELL PARROTT

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