Regional significance of an Early Holocene moraine in Enchantment Lakes Basin, North Cascade Range, Washington

Auteurs :
WAITT, R. B. Jr
YOUNT, J. C.
DAVIS, P. T.

Description :
The upper Enchantment Lakes Basin in the North Cascade Range of Washington displays two moraine belts, each recording an episode of glacier advance after the end of the last glaciation. The inner belt, the Brynhild, 0.1 to 0.5 km beyond existing glaciers is no more than a century old. The outer moraine, the Brisingamen, 0.3 to 0.7 km beyond existing glaciers, is weathered and is covered with large lichens. On and behind the Brisingamen moraine the Mazama ash (6900 yr old) is present. Despite more than 7 millennia of weathering, the rock surface behind the Brisingamen moraine is measurably less weathered than the surface beyond, which was last glaciated during the Rat Creek advance about 13,000 yr ago. The age of the Brisingamen moraine therefore is probably early Holocene. The Brisingamen moraine evidently correlates with moraines near Glacier Peak, near Mount Rainier, in northeastern and central Oregon, in the southern Canadian Rockies, and in the northern U.S. Rocky Mountains. These regional effects suggest that a climatic episode of cooling or increased snowfall affected the entire region some time during the early Holocene.


Type de document :
Article de périodique

Source :
Quaternary research New York, 1982, vol. 17, n°. 2, p. 191-210, Références bibliographiques : 61 réf.

Date :
1982