Local ice caps in Finderup Land, North Greenland, survived the Holocene Thermal Maximum

Citations Over TimeTop 10% of 2019 papers

Abstract

Local glaciers and ice caps ( GIC s) comprise only ~5.4% of the total ice volume, but account for ~14–20% of the current ice loss in Greenland. The glacial history of GIC s is not well constrained, however, and little is known about how they reacted to Holocene climate changes. Specifically, in North Greenland, there is limited knowledge about past GIC fluctuations and whether they survived the Holocene Thermal Maximum ( HTM , ~8 to 5 ka). In this study, we use proglacial lake records to constrain the ice‐marginal fluctuations of three local ice caps in North Greenland including Flade Isblink, the largest ice cap in Greenland. Additionally, we have radiocarbon dated reworked marine molluscs in Little Ice Age ( LIA ) moraines adjacent to the Flade Isblink, which reveal when the ice cap was smaller than present. We found that outlet glaciers from Flade Isblink retreated inland of their present extent from ~9.4 to 0.2 cal. ka BP . The proglacial lake records, however, demonstrate that the lakes continued to receive glacial meltwater throughout the entire Holocene. This implies that GIC s in Finderup Land survived the HTM . Our results are consistent with other observations from North Greenland but differ from locations in southern Greenland where all records show that the local ice caps at low and intermediate elevations disappeared completely during the HTM . We explain the north–south gradient in glacier response as a result of sensitivity to increased temperature and precipitation. While the increased temperatures during the HTM led to a complete melting of GIC s in southern Greenland, GIC s remained in North Greenland probably because the melting was counterbalanced by increased precipitation due to a reduction in Arctic sea‐ice extent and/or increased poleward moisture transport.

Related Papers

• → Electrical conductivity measurements from the GISP2 and GRIP Greenland ice cores(1993)280 cited
• → A comparison of the volcanic records over the past 4000 years from the Greenland Ice Core Project and Dye 3 Greenland ice cores(1997)208 cited
• → Reconstruction of the undiffused seasonal oxygen isotope signal in central Greenland ice cores(2000)26 cited
• → Post-Glacial Sea-Levels(1962)12 cited
• → Correction to “Possible solar influences on the dust profile of the GISP2 ice core from central Greenland”(1999)5 cited