30jähriges Bestandsjubiläum des Landesvereins für Höhlenkunde in Oberösterreich., 1955, Anonym,

30jähriges Bestandsjubiläum des Landesvereins für Höhlenkunde in Oberösterreich, 1955, Anonym,

Eine faunistische Bestandsaufnahme am Rande des Schiachen Lochs (Hochwieskof, Salzburg)., 1959, Mahler, F(riedrich).

[(1524/5)]

Eine faunistische Bestandsaufnahme am Rande des Schiachen Lochs (Hochwieskof, Salzburg), 1959, Mahler, F.

Bermuda--A partially drowned, late mature, Pleistocene karst, 1960, Bretz Jh,

During Pleistocene time, the Bermuda Islands repeatedly underwent partial inundation and re-emergence. The land areas were continuously attacked and reduced by rain and ground water but repeatedly renewed, during times of submergence, by deposition of marine limestone and by contemporaneous additions of shore-born and wind-transported carbonate sand, now eolianite. Soils formed under subaerial conditions are now buried beneath later deposits and constitute important stratigraphic markers. The igneous foundation rock appears to have been exposed during some low marine stands, and the former shorelines seem to be recorded by submerged terraces. The major karst features are largely below sea level, and they must date from times of continental glaciations. Previous writers have assigned eolian accumulation to times of Pleistocene low sea level and soil-making to times of interglacial high sea. Both conclusions are held to be erroneous

The Discovery, Exploration and Scientific Investigation of the Wellington Caves, New South Wales, 1963, Lane Edward A. , Richards Aola M.

Although research has been unable to establish a definite date of discovery for the limestone caves at Wellington, New South Wales, documentary evidence has placed it as 1828. The actual discovery could have been made earlier by soldiers or convicts from the Wellington Settlement, which dated from 1823. Whether the aborigines knew of the cave's existence before 1828 is uncertain, but likely, as in 1830 they referred to them as "Mulwang". A number of very small limestone caves were also discovered about the same time in the nearby Molong area. The Bungonia Caves, in the Marulan district near Goulburn, were first written about a short time later. On all the evidence available at present, the Wellington Caves can be considered to be the first of any size discovered on the mainland of Australia. The Wellington Caves are situated in a low, limestone outcrop about six miles south by road from the present town of Wellington, and approximately 190 miles west-north-west of Sydney. They are at an altitude of 1000 feet, about half a mile from the present bed of the Bell River, a tributary of the Macquarie River. One large cave and several small caves exist in the outcrop, and range in size from simple shafts to passages 200 to 300 feet long. Mining for phosphate has been carried out, resulting in extensive galleries, often unstable, at several levels. Two caves have been lit by electricity for the tourist trades; the Cathedral Cave, 400 feet long, maximum width 100 feet, and up to 50 feet high; and the smaller Gaden Cave. The Cathedral Cave contains what is believed to be the largest stalagmite in the world, "The Altar", which stands on a flat floor, is 100 feet round the base and almost touches the roof about 40 feet above. It appears that the name Cathedral was not applied to the cave until this century. The original names were "The Great Cave", "The Large Cave" or "The Main Cave". The Altar was named by Thomas Mitchell in 1830. See map of cave and Plate. Extensive Pleistocene bone deposits - a veritable mine of bone fragments - were found in 1830, and have been studied by palaeontologists almost continually ever since. These bone deposits introduced to the world the extinct marsupials of Australia, and have a special importance in view of the peculiar features of the living fauna of the continent. The names of many famous explorers and scientists are associated with this history, among the most prominent being Sir Thomas Mitchell and Sir Richard Owen. Anderson (1933) gives a brief outline of why the Wellington Caves fossil bone beds so rapidly attracted world-wide interest. During the 18th and early 19th Century, the great palaeontologist, Baron Georges Cuvier, and others, supposed that the earth had suffered a series of catastrophic changes in prehistoric times. As a result of each of these, the animals living in a certain area were destroyed, the area being repopulated from isolated portions of the earth that had escaped the catastrophe. The Bilical Deluge was believed to have been the most recent. Darwin, during the voyage of the Beagle around the world (1832-37), was struck by the abundance of Pleistocene mammalian fossils in South America, and also by the fact that, while these differed from living forms, and were in part of gigantic dimensions, they were closely related to present-day forms in that continent. Darwin's theory of descent with modification did not reconcile with the ideas of Cuvier and others. As the living mammalian fauna of Australia was even more distinctive than that of South America, it was a matter of importance and excitement to discover the nature of the mammals which had lived in Australia in the late Tertiary and Pleistocene.

Bestandsentwicklung der in Höhlen überwinternden Fledermäuse auf der Schwäbischen Alb., 1980, Frank H. , Nagel A. , Weigold H.

[Deutschland]

Bestandsentwicklung der in Höhlen überwinternden Fledermäuse auf der Schwäbischen Alb, 1980, Frank H. , Nagel A. , Weigold H.

Estimates of late Pleistocene sea level high stands from San Salvador, Bahamas, 1984, Carew J. L. , Mylroie J. , Wehmiller J. F. , Lively R. S.

Barbuda--an emerging reef and lagoon complex on the edge of the Lesser Antilles island are, 1985, Brasier M, Donahue J,

The Pliocene to Holocene limestones of Barbuda have formed on a wide, shallow, outlying bank of the Lesser Antilles island arc, some 50 km east of the older axis of the Limestone Caribbees and 100 km east of the newer axis of the active Volcanic Caribbees. Contrasts with neighbouring islands of similar size include the lack of exposed igneous basement or mid-Tertiary sediments, the dominance of younger flat-lying carbonates, and the greater frequency of earthquake shocks. The history of emergence of the island has been studied through aerial reconnaissance, mapping, logging, hand coring, facies and microfacies analysis. These show a pattern of progressively falling high sea level stands (from more than 50 m down to the present level) on which are superimposed at least three major phases of subaerial exposure, when sea levels were close to, or below, their present level. This sequence can be summarized as follows: 1, bank edge facies (early Pliocene Highlands Formation) deposited at not more than c. 50-100 m above the present sea level; 2, emergence with moderate upwarping in the north, associated with the Bat Hole subaerial phase forming widespread karst; 3, older Pleistocene transgression with fringing reefs and protected bays formed at l0 to l5 m high sea level stands (Beazer Formation); 4, Marl Pits subaerial phase with widespread karst and soil formation; 5, late Pleistocene transgression up to m high stand with fringing and barrier reefs, protected backreefs and bays (Codrington Formation Phase I); 6, gradual regression resulting in emergence of reefs, enclosure of lagoons, and progradation of beach ridges at heights falling from c. 5 m to below present sea level (Codrington Phase II); 7, Castle Bay subaerial phase produced karst, caliche and coastal dunes that built eastwards to below present sea level; and 8, Holocene transgression producing the present mosaic, with reefs, lagoons and prograding beach ridge complexes, with the present sea level reached before c. 4085 years BP. The evidence suggests that slight uplift took place in the north of the island after early Pliocene times. Subsequent shoreline fluctuations are consistent with glacio-eustatic changes in sea level, indicating that the island has not experienced significant uplift during the Quaternary

Abstract: Diving at Cocklebiddy Cave, 1985, Allum, Ron

Cocklebiddy Cave (Western Australia) lies 200km west of the South Australian border on the Nullarbor Plain. It is mostly waterfilled and represents the world's longest cave dive. In September1982 an Australian diving expedition had increased the known length to 4.3km. This was extended to 5.85km in 1983 by the French expedition led by F. Leguen, using motorised underwater scooters and lightweight equipment. The French party regarded the prospects for further extension as poor, since the hitherto wide passage had become rather constricted. The following month, October 1983, a team consisting of Hugh Morrison, Ron Allum and Peter Rogers with 11 supporting divers made a further attempt on the cave using only manual power. They established a camp at Toad Hall, a large air-filled chamber 4.3km into the cave, and dived from there to the constriction which had stopped the French team. From this point Hugh Morrison continued using only one air cylinder, and continued a further 240m. He was stopped only by shortage of air. The explored length of Cocklebiddy now stands at 6.09km, and the only barrier of further exploration is the logistic problem of carrying air cylinders through the constriction. (The full text of this paper is in Australian Caver No.109, pp 2-5, "Cocklebiddy, Australia - World's Longest Cave Dive")

238U---234U---230Th---232Th systematics and the precise measurement of time over the past 500,000 years, 1987, Lawrence Edwards R. , Chen J. H. , Wasserburg G. J. ,

We have developed techniques to measure the 230Th abundance in corals by isotope dilution mass spectrometry. This, coupled with our previous development of mass spectrometric techniques for 234U and 232Th measurement, has allowed us to reduce significantly the analytical errors in 238U---234U---230Th dating and greatly reduce the sample size. We show that 6 x 108 atoms of 230Th can be measured to 30[per mille sign] (2[sigma]) and 2 x 1010 atoms of 230Th to 2[per mille sign]. The time over which useful age data on corals can be obtained ranges from a few years to ~ 500 ky. The uncertainty in age, based on analytical errors, is 5 y (2[sigma]) for a 180 year old coral (3 g), 44 y at 8294 years and 1.1 ky at 123.1 ky (250 mg of coral). We also report 232Th concentrations in corals (0.083-1.57 pmol/g) that are more than two orders of magnitude lower than previous values. Ages with high analytical precision were determined for several corals that grew during high sea level stands ~ 120 ky ago. These ages lie specifically within or slightly postdate the Milankovitch insolation high at 128 ky and support the idea that the dominant cause of Pleistocene climate change is Milankovitch forcing

DENUDATION CHRONOLOGY FROM CAVE AND RIVER TERRACE LEVELS - THE CASE OF THE BUCHAN KARST, SOUTHEASTERN AUSTRALIA, 1992, Webb J. A. , Fabel D. , Finlayson B. L. , Ellaway M. , Li S. , Spiertz H. P. ,

Detailed mapping of surface and underground karst features at Buchan, in eastern Victoria, has shown that the three river terraces along the Buchan River can be correlated with three levels of epiphreatic development in the nearby caves. Each level represents a stillstand in the denudational history of the area. Uranium series dating of speleothems and palaeomagnetic studies of cave sediments indicate that all three stillstands are more than 730 ka old. The periods of incision separating the stillstands were probably the result of active tectonic uplift. This contrasts with some northern parts of the Southeastern Highlands, which have been stable since the Eocene. The overall amount of incision and uplift at Buchan is small, indicating that the majority of scarp retreat in this section of the highlands must have occurred earlier. The denudation history of the Buchan area over the last 730 ka has seen only 2-3 m of incision, despite the major climatic and sea-level changes that have occurred in that time. Whereas most karst landscapes in the Northern Hemisphere have been extensively modified during the late Pleistocene, the Buchan karst was little affected, and its geomorphology has an older origin

230Th dating of the speleothems from the ''Grotta del Fiume-Grotta Grande del Vento'' karst system in Frasassi (Ancona, Italy) and paleoenvironmental implications., 1994, Taddeucci Adriano, Tuccimei Paola, Voltaggio Mario

Chronological measurements have been carried out on speleothems from the Grotta del Fiume-Grotta Grande del Vento karst system in Frasassi (Ancona, Italy) by means of the 230Th radiometric method in order to date hypogean karst levels and related geological events. Higher levels were found to be older than the lower ones according to standstills and sinkings of the water table. The dated speleothems from the first and second level formed less than 10,000 years ago; the minimum ages of the third and fifth levels, which are respectively 130,000 and 200,000 years old, were correlated to climatic events. Dating different portions of a speleothem allows the measurements of the radial and vertical accretion rates and their variation over time. Such data together with the 234U/238U activity ratio and the uranium content of the speleothems have been correlated with the climatic variations connected to the glacial cycles. The same data have been used to fit a hydrogeological model.

GEOLOGY AND KARST GEOMORPHOLOGY OF SAN-SALVADOR ISLAND, BAHAMAS, 1995, Mylroie J. E. , Carew J. L. ,

The exposed carbonates of the Bahamas consist of late Quaternary limestones that were deposited during glacio-eustatic highstands of sea level. Each highstand event produced transgressive-phase, stillstand-phase, and regressive-phase units. Because of slow platform subsidence, Pleistocene carbonates deposited on highstands prior to the last interglacial (oxygen isotope substage 5e, circa 125,000 years ago) are represented solely by eolianites. The Owl's Hole Formation comprises these eolianites, which are generally fossiliferous pelsparites. The deposits of the last interglacial form the Grotto Beach Formation, and contain a complete sequence of subtidal intertidal and eolian carbonates. These deposits are predominantly oolitic. Holocene deposits are represented by the Rice Bay Formation, which consists of intertidal and eolian pelsparites deposited during the transgressive-phase and stillstand-phase of the current sea-level highstand. The three formations are separated from one another by well-developed terra-rossa paleosols or other erosion surfaces that formed predominantly during intervening sea-level lowstands. The karst landforms of San Salvador consist of karren, depressions, caves, and blue holes. Karren are small-scale dissolutional etchings on exposed and soil-covered bedrock that grade downward into the epikarst, the system of tubes and holes that drain the bedrock surface. Depressions are constructional features, such as swales between eolian ridges, but they have been dissolutionally maintained. Pit caves are vertical voids in the vadose zone that link the epikarst to the water table. Flank margin caves are horizontal voids that formed in the distal margin of a past fresh-water lens; whereas banana holes are horizontal voids that developed at the top of a past fresh-water lens, landward of the lens margin. Lake drains are conduits that connect some flooded depressions to the sea. Blue holes are flooded vertical shafts, of polygenetic origin, that may lead into caves systems at depth. The paleokarst of San Salvador is represented by flank margin caves and banana holes formed in a past fresh-water lens elevated by the last interglacial sea-level highstand, and by epikarst buried under paleosols formed during sea-level lowstands. Both carbonate deposition and its subsequent karstification is controlled by glacio-eustatic sea-level position. On San Salvador, the geographic isolation of the island, its small size, and the rapidity of past sea level changes have placed major constraints on the production of the paleokarst