ABSTRACT An extensive kame-terrace sequence in the middle Rangitata Valley reveals ice-volume fluctuations spanning the last (Otiran) glaciation. Stratigraphic and sedimentologic characteristics document lateral ice-marginal processes and provide context for luminescence dating. The sequence provides novel and complementary data on glacier ice thickness, which fluctuated substantially throughout the Otiran glaciation. Thick ice constructed one of the highest kame terraces (540 m above the valley floor) ca. 68 ka and thinned nearly 500 m to the valley floor by ca. 53 ka. Following an episode of ice thickening to an unknown elevation, ice again thinned to the valley floor by ca. 44 ka. Ice thickened to its greatest late marine oxygen isotope stage (MIS) 3 extent of 480 m by ca. 37 ka, and thinned to 230 m by ca. 31 ka. The final ice expansion, to 260 m, occurred by ca. 25.5 ka, and the ice fluctuated and thinned to 240 m at ca. 22–20 ka and to 170 m at ca. 21–17 ka. Published cosmogenic radionuclide (CRN) ages indicate surface stabilization near the valley floor (55 m) by ca. 18 ka. This ice-thickness chronology provides an independently derived ice-volume record that is consistent with local and regional glacial chronologies. The site, lying between the Mackenzie Basin and the northern Canterbury Plains drainages, displays a chronology with advances correlative in part with each of those regions. Maximum ice extent occurred 70–65 ka in the Rangitata Valley and the Mackenzie Basin, while the subsequent ice expansion ca. 37 ka is similar in timing to chronologies in both the Rakaia Valley to the north and the Mackenzie Basin to the south.

ABSTRACT Lobes, or ice streams, of the southern Laurentide ice sheet readvanced periodically during their overall retreat after the Last Glacial Maximum in the Great Lakes region. The Saginaw Lobe readvanced around 20 ka to form a prominent moraine, the Sturgis moraine, near the Michigan-Indiana border. Detailed mapping of nineteen 7½ min quadrangles at a scale of 1:24,000 in and adjacent to Calhoun County, Michigan, supports the interpretation that a large drumlin field behind the moraine was formed at this time, when the basal drainage of the glacier was distributed with high basal pore pressure. During retreat, after moraine construction, the drainage mode switched to a conduit-type system, in which meltwater drained to recessional ice-marginal positions through tunnel valleys. We mapped at least three discontinuous ice-marginal positions on the basis of coarse-grained, subaerial fans beginning at the ends of the tunnel valleys. There is a close association of kames with the tunnel valleys at these locations, suggesting that supraglacial meltwater contributed to the subglacial drainage. Our results support a model in which the drumlins were produced by deformation of the basal diamicton during ice advance prior to the formation of the tunnel valleys during ice retreat. This hypothesis rebuts a previously proposed model for this area in which the drumlins and tunnel valleys, along with boulder gravel deposits, were attributed to formation during a single, catastrophic subglacial sheetflood.

ABSTRACT Glaciotectonic deformation of glacigenic deposits in southwestern Michigan is described and analyzed to determine the source of stress of these strained sediments, which manifests as overturned folds and other deformation similar to shallow crustal décollements. The succession is exposed in 11 aggregate mining operations along the Valparaiso Upland, in portions of Berrien, Van Buren, and Allegan Counties in southwest Michigan. Observed deformation includes a complex array of folds, faults, and thrust features as much as 5 m below the surface exposure of the pit face, consistent with horizontal compressional stresses that were generally aligned with ice flow. Fabric measurement of elongated clasts in the surficial till indicates ice flow from northwest to southeast across the area and parallel to drumlins in the area. Stratigraphically, the area is dominated by fine, lacustrine deposits with coarse sand and gravel capped by the Saugatuck Till during the last glaciation. Sediment grain size, pore-water pressure fluctuations, and topographic relief are interpreted to be responsible for the deformation observed as the Lake Michigan Lobe overrode a proglacial lake basin, including fans and deltas, as it advanced eastward to the Kalamazoo moraine. The fine texture and fabric of the lacustrine sediment package restricted the flow of subglacial water and caused abrupt local increases of pore-water pressure and concomitant coupling and decoupling of the bed-substrate interface. Advancing ice deformed sediments in two stages: (1) proglacially along a décollement at the ice margin, and then (2) subglacially as ice overrode the sediments.

ABSTRACT The glaciated terrain along the northern edge of the Appalachian Plateau in the eastern Finger Lakes of central New York has long been recognized as an important location for meltwater routing and for proglacial lake development in the Great Lakes region. Despite recognition of multiple ice margins formed by the Ontario Lobe of the Laurentide ice sheet during the late Wisconsinan, numerical age control of several margins has been elusive, particularly in regard to regional readvances of the Port Bruce (ca. 16,980–18,000 cal [calibrated] yr B.P.) and Port Huron (ca. 14,300– 16,000 cal yr B.P.) Phases. Utilizing light detection and ranging (LiDAR) terrain models in the eastern Finger Lakes area, we identified and described the Mapleton, Tully, and Labrador Hollow moraines. Associated ice-marginal landforms include push moraines, fans, and hummocky topography. In places, these features intrude into the northern heads of through valleys. Coring of three basins directly associated with these landforms yielded more than 20 samples of boreal tree needles and twigs, and Dryas leaves. Accelerated mass spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon assay results indicate that poststadial lacustrine sedimentation began at ca. 15,000 cal yr B.P., consistent with ages of the Port Huron Phase.

Abstract Understanding the sediments deposited by glaciers or other cold-climate processes assumes enhanced significance in the context of current global warming and the predicted melt and retreat of glaciers and ice sheets. This volume analyses glacial, proglacial and periglacial settings focusing, among others, on sedimentation at termini of tidewater glaciers, on hitherto not-well-understood high-mountain features, and on sediments such as slope and aeolian deposits whose clasts were sourced in glacial and periglacial regions, but have been transported and deposited by azonal processes. Difficulties are thus often encountered in inferring Pleistocene and pre-Pleistocene cold-climate conditions when the sedimentary record lacks many of the specific diagnostic indicators. The main objective of this volume is to establish the validity and limitations of the evidence that can be obtained from widely distributed clastic deposits, in order to achieve reliable palaeogeographic and palaeoclimatic reconstructions. At a more general level and on the much longer geological timescale, an understanding of ice-marginal and periglacial environments may better prepare us for the unavoidable reversal towards cooler and perhaps even glacial times in the future.