A Thesis Entitled the Deglacial Chronology of the Sturgis Moraine
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A Thesis entitled The Deglacial Chronology of the Sturgis Moraine in South-Central Michigan and Northeast Indiana by Jennifer M. Horton Submitted to the Graduate Faculty as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Science Degree in Geology _________________________________________ Timothy G. Fisher, PhD., Committee Chair _________________________________________ Richard Becker, PhD., Committee Member _________________________________________ James M. Martin-Hayden PhD., Committee Member _________________________________________ Patricia R. Komuniecki, PhD., Dean College of Graduate Studies The University of Toledo August, 2015 Copyright 2015, Jennifer Marie Horton This document is copyrighted material. Under copyright law, no parts of this document may be reproduced without the expressed permission of the author. An Abstract of The Deglacial Chronology of the Sturgis Moraine in South-Central Michigan and Northeast Indiana by Jennifer M. Horton Submitted to the Graduate Faculty as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the The Master of Science Degree in Geology The University of Toledo August, 2015 Understanding the timing and rate of ice retreat in the Great Lakes Region is critical to understanding any relationship between ice lobes and climate during the Late Wisconsinan time period. The purpose of this study is to constrain the age of the Sturgis Moraine, an end moraine of the Saginaw Lobe in south-central Michigan using minimum-limiting radiocarbon and OSL ages. Previous correlations between till stratigraphy and end moraines suggest that the Sturgis Moraine formed between 15,500 and 16,100 14C yrs BP, but with little direct supporting chronologic data. To date the Sturgis Moraine, Livingstone sediment cores were collected from three scour lakes within tunnel channels at the distal side of the moraine. Scour rather than kettle lakes are chosen to minimize any organic accumulation lag from meltout of buried ice. Basal ages from gravelly sand in these cores are 13,700±60, 13,750±80, and 13,300±60 14C yrs BP. These ages are similar to basal ages from Clear Lake (13,300±300 14C yrs BP), a kettle lake on the distal side of the Valparaiso Moraine of the Lake Michigan Lobe, and the Hyre (13,690±50 14C yrs BP), iii Kenan (13,880±70 14C yrs BP), and Pyles (13,510±160 14C yrs BP) sites from kettle lakes on the distal side of the Fort Wayne Moraine of the Huron Erie Lobe. The minimum- limiting ages for the Sturgis Moraine presented in this study suggest a younger ice margin and smaller Saginaw re-entrant than previously envisioned. OSL dated sand dunes from within an outwash valley distal of the Saginaw Moraine (14.3±0.6 and 14.1±0.5 ka) and from dunes that migrated out of the valley bottom (12.6±0.4, 12.3±0.4, 12.4±0.5 and 12.0±0.4 ka) appear to record two separate aeolian activation periods. These ages agree with other sand dune chronologies from northwest Indiana and northwest Ohio suggesting regional variation in climate at these times. The radiocarbon and OSL ages from this study provide a best limiting minimum age of 13,750 ± 80 14C yrs BP (16,320-16,930 cal yrs BP) for deglaciation at the Sturgis Moraine. iv Acknowledgements I would like to thank the various people who aided with this project: firstly thanks to Mark McDonald and John Dilworth for their assistance in the field and lab, Butch Berger for his mechanical support and my committee members Dr. Jamie Martin-Hayden and Dr. Richard Becker for their guidance throughout this process. I would also like to thank my fellow University of Toledo graduate geology students; this project wouldn’t have been possible without their friendship and good humor. The William A. Kneller Graduate Support Fund, and Dr. Lon Ruedisili Hydrogeology/Environmental Geology Fund made OSL dating possible. OSL dating was processed by Dr. Kenneth Lepper from North Dakota State University. Very special thanks to the Indiana Geologic Survey for providing funding and support for this project. In particular I would like to thank Marni Karaffa and Henry Loope from the Indiana Geological Survey for making this project possible through funding and numerous hours of assistance. I would especially like to thank my advisor Timothy Fisher, for engineering the theme of this thesis and for all he has taught me during my duration at The University of Toledo. v Table of Contents Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iii Acknowledgements ..............................................................................................................v Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... vi List of Tables ................................................................................................................... ix List of Figures ......................................................................................................................x 1 Introduction .........................................................................................................1 1.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................1 1.2 Summery of deglacial events .............................................................................2 1.3 Deglaciation and pro-glacial lake chronology ...................................................5 1.4 Study Area .......................................................................................................21 1.5 Sand dune chronology of Great Lake Region ..................................................23 1.6 Objective and Hypothesis ................................................................................26 2 Methodology…. .....................................................................................................27 2.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................27 2.2 Site selection ....................................................................................................27 2.3 Coring .......................................................................................................28 2.4 Photograph .......................................................................................................29 2.5 Magnetic Susceptibility ...................................................................................29 2.6 Loss-on-Ignition ...............................................................................................30 vi 2.7 Grain Size Analysis..........................................................................................30 2.8 Radiocarbon dating ..........................................................................................30 2.9 Radiocarbon to calendar year conversions ......................................................31 2.10 OSL dating .....................................................................................................32 2.11 Surficial Mapping ..........................................................................................32 3 Results 3.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................34 3.2 Surficial Mapping ............................................................................................35 3.3 Coring Sites ......................................................................................................38 3.4 Core Lithology .................................................................................................41 3.5 Fennel Lake Core .............................................................................................42 3.6 Wall Lake Sediment Core ................................................................................44 3.7 Sweet Lake Sediment Core ..............................................................................46 3.8 Radiocarbon Dates and Interpretations ...........................................................48 3.9 OSL ages .......................................................................................................50 4 Discussion .......................................................................................................53 4.1 Radiocarbon Ages and Implications ................................................................53 4.2 Radiocarbon Ages and Paleoclimate proxies ...................................................59 4.3 Sturgis Moraine and radiocarbon chronology of Great Lakes .........................62 4.4 Sand dune chronology and implications ..........................................................67 5. Summary and Conclusions ....................................................................................69 5.1 Summary .......................................................................................................69 5.2 Conclusion .......................................................................................................71 vii 5.3 Future Work .....................................................................................................71 References .......................................................................................................73 A Loss on Ignition .....................................................................................................82 B Magnetic Susceptibility .........................................................................................89