Late and Postglacial Paleoenvironments of Tierra del Fuego: terrestrial and marine palynological evidence

BORROMEI, A.M.; QUATTROCCHIO, M.

The Late Cenozoic of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego.

Elsevier Science Ltd.

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2008; p. 369 - 381

The vegetation and paleoclimate of southernmost part ofSouth America, Tierra del Fuego, during Late Pleistocene–Holocene times and following the wastage of iceageglaciers, were subjects of intensive study mainly byHeusser (1987, 1989a, b, c, 1990, 1993a, b, 1994a, b,1995a, 1997, 1998, 2003), Heusser and Rabassa (1987,1995), Markgraf (1980a, b, 1983, 1991a, b, 1993a, b),Markgraf et al. (1992, 2002), Markgraf and Anderson(1994), Borromei (1995), Markgraf and Kenny (1997),Quattrocchio and Borromei (1998), Borromei andQuattrocchio (2001), Pendall et al. (2001), Grill et al. (2002),Mauquoy et al. (2004), following the pioneering workearlier in this century of Va¨ino¨ Auer (1933, 1956, 1958,1970, 1974).Data from the southernmost part of Chile (south of53 S), by comparison, are relatively limited with fewrecords, mainly along the Estrecho de Magallanes andthe Bahı´a Inu´til depressions (Heusser, 1987, 1995b,2003; Heusser et al., 2000), on the northern side ofthe Fuegian Andes axis (the Onamonte site) (Heusser,1993a, 2003) and Caleta Ro´balo, at Puerto Williams, IslaNavarino (Heusser, 1987, 1989a).This contribution primarily includes the publisheddata available to the authors on the palynofloristic evolutionof the Late Cenozoic of southern Tierra del Fuego(Beagle Channel area). Paleovegetational communitiesand paleoenvironments of the Late Pleistocene and Holocenein southern Tierra del Fuego are interpreted frompollen assemblages, microplankton and palynofacies inradiocarbon-dated peat bogs, glaciolacustrine sedimentsand marine deposits.