Regional Deglaciation And Postglacial Lake Development As Reflected In A 74m Sedimentary Record From Lake Vattern, Southern Sweden

The withdrawal of the Late Weichselian ice sheet and rapid isostatic uplift in southern Scandinavia led to the entrainment of large volumes of melt water within the proglacial Baltic Ice Lake (BIL). The eventual western outpost of BIL, Lake Vattern, has been a focal point for studying the dynamic retreat history of the Late Weichselian ice sheet in south central Sweden. This part of the deglacial history is described from an abundance of terrestrial studies, but, to date, no complimentary long sediment cores from Lake Vattern have been available. Here, we present the results from a unique, 74m borehole in southern Lake Vattern that recovered a Late Pleistocene to Holocene sedimentary sequence. Physical and chemical analyses of the sediment and pore water, together with geophysical mapping, reveal glacial as well as postglacial imprints implying an oscillating ice sheet margin, evidence for neotectonic activity and one or more marine incursions into the lake during deglaciation. We attribute the glaciotectonic deformation of the sediments at 54m below the lake floor to an ice readvance that likely occurred at the same time or before the advance that formed the Levene moraine (approximate to 13.8-13.4cal.kaBP). After this event, potential readvances were likely restricted to a more northerly position in the basin. We identify the final drainage of the BIL, but find evidence for an earlier marine incursion into the Vattern basin (approximate to 13.0cal.kaBP), indicating water exchange between the North Atlantic and the Baltic Ice Lake during the late Allerod.