The age of the “old red sand” on the coasts of south Fujian and west Guangdong, China

The sedimentary strata and deposition ages of the “old red sand” distributed along the coasts of south Fujian and west Guangdong are determined by lithostratigraphy, magnetic stratigraphy and earth chemistry combined with TL, ESR and 14 C-dating techniques. The research shows that the “old red sand” was aeolian sediments deposited from 55 400 to 9 000 aBP, the last glacial period in the middle and later age of Late Pleistocene. Most of them deposited in two periods of 56-42 ka and 30-10 ka. The “old red sand” deposited in the period of 30-10 ka, the later Würm glacier substage (Q 3 3 ), developed on the largest scale with the widest distribution.