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Recent sedimentation in a high arctic lake, northern Ellesmere Island, Canada

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Abstract

A multiple core study was conducted on laminated minerogenic sediments from Lake C2, Northern Ellesmere Island, Canadian High Arctic. Lateral persistence, distal thinning, variation in grain size of these laminations as well as present-day processes of highly seasonal sediment transfer into the lake basin suggest that clastic varves have been formed. Sedimentation rates based on 210Pb dating agree well with sedimentation rates based on lamination counts giving further evidence that laminations are annual. Errors in varve counting were reduced from 12% to < 2% using the multi-core approach of cross-correlating all records. Varved sediments are occasionally interrupted by thick coarse-grained layers, which are interpreted as deposits of turbidity currents and may be related to extremely high discharge events and slope failures of the delta front. Micro-laminated sediments spanning the last two centuries were studied in detail. Suspension settling is the dominant process of deposition depending upon stream discharge which is controlled by nival melt and summer temperatures. Application of varve chronology thus allows to use lamination thickness measurements as source of high resolution proxy data for palaeoclimatic reconstruction.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fachbereich VI/Geologie, Universität Trier, D-54286, Thier, Germany

    Bern Zolitschka

  2. GeoforschungsZentrum Potsdam, Telegrafenberg A26, D-14473, Potsdam, Germany

    Bern Zolitschka

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  1. Bern Zolitschka
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This is the fifth in a series of papers published in this issue on the Taconite Inlet Lakes Project. These papers were collected by Dr R. S. Bradley.

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Zolitschka, B. Recent sedimentation in a high arctic lake, northern Ellesmere Island, Canada. J Paleolimnol 16, 169–186 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00176934

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