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Holocene Palaeosalinity in a Maya Wetland, Belize, Inferred from the Microfaunal Assemblage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Javier A. Alcala-Herrera,
John S. Jacob,
Maria Luisa Machain Castillo and
Raymond W. Neck
Javier A. Alcala-Herrera
Affiliation:
Geochemical and Environmental Research Group, Texas A&M University, 833 Graham Road, College Station, Texas 77845
John S. Jacob
Affiliation:
Department of Soil and Crop Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas 77843-2474
Maria Luisa Machain Castillo
Affiliation:
Instituto de Ciencias del Mar y Limnologia, Apartado postal 70-305, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México D.F. 04510, Mexico
Raymond W. Neck
Affiliation:
Houston Museum of Natural Science, One Herman Circle Drive, Houston, Texas 77030-1799
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Abstract

A 5.4-m sequence of peat and marl overlying a basal clay in a northern Belize wetland was studied to assess salinity changes over the past 7000 yr. The distribution of ostracods, gastropods, and foraminifers revealed initially freshwater conditions in a terrestrial wetland, changing to at least mesohaline conditions by about 5600 yr B.P. The mesohaline conditions corresponded to the formation of an open-water lagoon (and precipitation of a lacustrine marl) that was contemporaneous with rapidly rising sea level in the area. A mangrove peat filled the lagoon by 4800 yr B.P. probably as a result of increasingly shallow waters as sea level rise slowed and marl precipitation continued. A new lagoon began to form sometime after 3400 yr B.P. Freshwater ostracods and gastropods found in the marl of this lagoon suggest that it formed under near-limnetic conditions. Freshwater input likely resulted from massive deforestation by the Maya that began by 4400 yr B.P. Subsidence of the mangrove peat likely permitted the formation of a lagoon. A peat has filled the lagoon since at least 500 yr B.P.

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Articles
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Quaternary Research , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , January 1994, pp. 121 - 130
Copyright
University of Washington

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