T60 Quaternary Paleolakes: Their Utility in Paleohydrologic, Paleoclimatic, Tectonic, and Biogeographic Studies (Posters)

GEOHISTORY OF AN UPPER WEICHSELIAN OXBOW LAKE FROM HUNGARY (CENTRAL EUROPE)

Paper number: T60-25
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 1:30 PM – 4:30 PM

Authors

Abstract

One of the largest late Pleistocene paleochannels is situated in the SW part of Hungary, at Kardoskút village, on the area of the Körös – Maros National Park. This oxbow lake was nominated Fehér-lake (White-lake) because the highly alkaline lacustrine water is strongly connected to the fluctuating water table so the lake quite often dries completely out during the hot and dry summers leaving behind a white amorphous silicate dust cover on the dried lacustrine bottom. The natural floodplain vegetation is soloncak steppe (Artemisio – Festucetum pseudovinae) with loessic steppe around the lake where the surface sediments consist of infusion (alluvial) loess to a depth of 2-3 ms underlain by fluvial sands. Inwards the prevailing marsh vegetation is dominated by Carex – Typha latifolia – Phragmitetum australis stands. The Fehér-lake is situated on the alluvial fan of the Körös and Maros rivers. The lake was formed by avulsion, a whole channel segment was abandoned, and the river adopted a new course, probably after a severe flood. The length of the lake is 4 km long in the E – W direction and the width of the lake is 100 – 500 m N – S direction. This paper presents the first results of a multidisciplinary paleoecological study aimed at reconstructing the late Quaternary environmental and paleohidrological history of the Fehér-lake. The gained results of the applied complex methods of sedimentology, pollen, mollusk, and geochemical analyses controlled with radiocarbon dating revealed a sedimentary sequence extending back into the last glacial.