POLLEN ANALYSIS OF FOUR CORES FROM THE MISSISSIPPI ALLUVIAL VALLEY NEAR CHARLESTON, MISSOURI

Summary

This pollen study was undertaken at the northern margin of the northern

Mississippi Valley in the Eastern Lowlands, an area which offers unique

conditions for studying the paleoenvironment. Four pollen columns were

collected in the vicinity of Charleston, Missouri, immediately south of the

present confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. Both late Pleisto

cene braided stream deposits and Holocene flood plain deposits are noted in

this area. Location of the study area at the hinge point between the erosional

Mississippi River to the north and the depositional Mississippi River

to the south provides a unique circumstance most likely to preserve evidence

of catastrophic floods associated with deglaciation of the North American

continent (Porter 1991).

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• PaleoResearch Institute

Record Identifiers

PRI Technical Report(s): 90-050

File Information