Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T09:28:58.287Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Plant and Insect Fossils at Norwood in South-Central Minnesota: A Record of Late-Glacial Succession1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Allan C. Ashworth ,
Donald P. Schwert ,
William A. Watts  and
H.E. Wright
Allan C. Ashworth
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, North Dakota State University, Fargo, North Dakota 58105
Donald P. Schwert
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, North Dakota State University, Fargo, North Dakota 58105
William A. Watts
Affiliation:
Limnological Research Center, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455
H.E. Wright
Affiliation:
Limnological Research Center, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Norwood site in Sibley Co., Minnesota, contains 1.6 m of silt resting on till and overlain by peat. The base of the peat has been radiocarbon dated at 12,400 ± 60 and the top at 11,200 ± 250 yr B.P. The pollen, plant macrofossils, and insect remains in the basal silt consist of boreal species inhabiting open environments, but not tundra. No modern analogue exists for the insect assemblage, which includes elements of boreal forest, tundra-forest, and western affinities. The transition from an unstable open environment to a stable coniferous forest is reflected by both plant and insect fossils and is interpreted as a successional rather than a climatic event. During this time of significant biologic change, the climate is inferred to have been relatively uniform, with temperatures similar to those presently existing in the boreal forest south of the tundra-forest transition zone. The geologic and ecologic succession at Norwood is generally similar to that presently associated with ice stagnation of the Klutlan Glacier in the Yukon Territory. Localized successional sequences similar to those at Norwood are conceived to have occurred repeatedly during the melting of the Laurentide ice, and thus the proposed model has potentially broad application to the interpretation of late-glacial sequences.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 16 , Issue 1 , July 1981 , pp. 66 - 79
Copyright
University of Washington

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

1

Contribution 227, Limnological Research Center, University of Minnesota.

References

Ashworth, A.C. (1977). A late Wisconsinan coleopterous assemblage from southern Ontario and its environmental significance. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 14, 1625–1634.Google Scholar
Ashworth, A.C. (1979). A method of recovering fossil insect remains from clays, peats, and silts. In “Carabid Beetles, Their Evolution, Natural History, and Classification.” (Erwin, T.L., Ball, G.E., Whitehead, D.R., Eds.). p. 406. Junk, The Hague.Google Scholar
Ashworth, A.C. (1980). Environmental implications of a beetle assemblage from the Gervais Formation (Early Wisconsinan?), Minnesota. Quaternary Research 13, 200–212.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Birks, H.J.B. (1976). Late-Wisconsinan vegetational history at Wolf Creek, central Minnesota. Ecological Monographs 46, 395–429.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bright, D.E. Jr. (1976). The Bark Beetles of Canada and Alaska (Coleoptera: Scolytidae). The Insects and Arachnids of Canada, Part 2 Information Canada, OttawaCanada Department of Agriculture Publication 1576.Google Scholar
Faegri, K., Iversen, J. (1975). Textbook of Pollen Analysis Munksgaard, Copenhagen.Google Scholar
Florin, M.B. (1970). Late-glacial diatoms of Kirchner Marsh, southeastern Minnesota. Nova Hedwigia Beihefte 31, 667–729.Google Scholar
Florin, M.B., Wright, H.E. Jr. (1969). Diatom evidence for the persistence of stagnant glacial ice in Minnesota. Geological Society of America Bulletin 80, 695–704.Google Scholar
Glaser, P.H. (1981). Transport and deposition of leaves and seeds on tundra: A late-glacial analogue. Arctic and Alpine Researchin press.Google Scholar
Jelgersma, S. (1962). A late-glacial pollen diagram from Madelia, south-central Minnesota. American Journal of Science 260, 522–529.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindroth, C.H. (1961). The ground-beetles (Carabidae, excl. Cicindelidae) of Canada and Alaska, 2. Opuscula Entomologica Supplementum 20, 1–202.Google Scholar
Lindroth, C.H. (1963). The ground-beetles (Carabidae, excl. Cicindelidae) of Canada and Alaska, 3. Opuscula Entomologica Supplementum 24, 201–406.Google Scholar
Lindroth, C.H. (1966). The ground-beetles (Carabidae, excl. Cicindelidae) of Canada and Alaska, 4. Opuscula Entomologica Supplementum 29, 409–648.Google Scholar
Lindroth, C.H. (1968). The ground-beetles (Carabidae, excl. Cicindelidae) of Canada and Alaska, 5. Opuscula Entomologica Supplementum 33, 694–944.Google Scholar
Lindroth, C.H. (1969). The ground-beetles (Carabidae, excl. Cicindelidae) of Canada and Alaska, 6. Opuscula Entomologica Supplementum 34, 945–1192.Google Scholar
Malmquist, K.E. (1979). Paleoecology of Late Quaternary Molluscan-Ostracod Assemblages from the Norwood Site, Southeastern Minnesota. M.S. thesis University of North Dakota.Google Scholar
Morgan, A. (1972). The fossil occurrence of Helophorus arcticus Brown (Coleoptera: Hydrophilidae) in Pleistocene deposits of the Scarborough Bluffs, Ontario. Canadian Journal of Zoology 50, 555–558.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morgan, A.V., Morgan, A. (1979). The fossil Coleoptera of the Two Creeks Forest Bed, Wisconsin. Quaternary Research 12, 226–240.Google Scholar
d'Orchymont, A., Brown, W.J. (1940). Helophorus arcticus Brown, a living fossil (Coleoptera). Canadian Entomologist 72, 1–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pierce, R.R. (1961). Lower Upper Cretaceous plant microfossils from Minnesota. Minnesota Geological Survey Bulletin 42, 1–86.Google Scholar
Ruhe, R.V. (1969). Quaternary Landscapes in Iowa Iowa State Univ. Press, Ames.Google Scholar
Schwert, D.P., Morgan, A.V. (1980). Paleoenvironmental implications of a late-glacial insect assemblage from northwestern New York. Quaternary Research 13, 93–110.Google Scholar
Scoggan, H.J. (1957). Flora of Manitoba. National Museum of Canada Bulletin 140, 1–619.Google Scholar
Watts, W.A. (1967). Late-glacial plant macrofossils from Minnesota. In “Quaternary Paleoecology” (Cushing, E.J., Wright, H.E. Jr., Eds.). pp. 89–98. Yale Univ. Press, New Haven, Conn.Google Scholar
Watts, W.A. (1979). Late Quaternary vegetation of Central Appalachia and the New Jersey Coastal Plain. Ecological Monographs 49, 427–469.Google Scholar
Watts, W.A., Winter, T.C. Jr. (1966). Plant macrofossils from Kirchner Marsh, Minnesota—A paleoecological study. Geological Society of America Bulletin 77, 1339–1359.Google Scholar
Wright, H.E. Jr. (1976). Ice retreat and vegetation in the western Great Lakes area. In Quaternary Stratigraphy of North America.” (Mahaney, W.C. Ed.), pp. 119–132. Dowden, Hutchinson, & Ross, Stroudsberg, Pa Google Scholar
Wright, H.E. Jr. (1980). Surge moraines of Klutlan Glacier, Yukon, Canada—Origin, wastage, vegetation succession, lake development, and application to the late-glacial of Minnesota. Quaternary Research 14, 2–18.Google Scholar
van Zant, K. (1979). Late-glacial and postglacial pollen and plant macrofossils from Lake West Okoboji, northwestern Iowa. Quaternary Research 12, 358–380.Google Scholar