Toward a Master Chronology for Western Greenland’s Fjord Stade Moraines: New 10Be Ages from the Søndre Isortoq Region

Abstract:

Reconstructions of Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS) margin fluctuations during the Holocene place empirical constraints on the extent of the GrIS that can be used as benchmark data for ice-sheet climate models. Here, we reconstruct the early Holocene ice margin history of the Søndre Isortoq region of western Greenland to evaluate the response of the GrIS to Holocene climate change. The moraines in this region are part of an extensive moraine system known as the Fjord Stade moraines, which have been nearly continuously traced throughout western Greenland. These moraines have been directly dated to 9.2 and 8.2 ka in the Disko Bugt region, suggesting that they represent a readvance or stillstand of the GrIS in response to the 9.3 and 8.2 ka abrupt cooling events, respectively. However, because the Fjord Stade moraines have not been directly and precisely dated elsewhere, it is unclear whether the entire western GrIS margin responded to these events or not. To address this issue, we selected boulders from two sites in the Søndre Isortoq region for cosmogenic ¹⁰Be exposure dating. In Nunatarssuaq, we sampled eight erratic boulders perched on bedrock beyond and inside of the Fjord Stade moraines. Samples from Qátqatsiaq include nine Fjord Stade moraine boulders and seven erratic boulders that bracket the moraines. We found that the Fjord Stade moraines in the Søndre Isortoq region were abandoned at ~9 ka and that they may be correlated with the outer Fjord Stade moraines in Disko Bugt. If the western GrIS margin did respond to the 9.3 ka cooling event, the later age of ~9 ka at Søndre Isortoq could suggest that land-terminating sectors of the GrIS are less sensitive to centennial-scale climate change than their marine-terminating counterparts. In addition, exposure ages for moraine boulders and boulders inside the moraines are indistinguishable within dating uncertainties, indicating that once initiated, retreat from the Fjord Stade moraines occurred rapidly.