Holocene Fluctuations of the Bilchenok Glacier, Kamchatka Peninsula.

Pleistocene and Holocene glacier fluctuations upon the Kamchatka Peninsula

“…For each of these glaciers, this age constraint is based upon a till found between the Khangar (KHG) (c. 7.8 ka) and Shiveluch 5 (SH5) (c.2.6 ka) tephra layers (table 2). There is also evidence that Bilchenok Glacier advanced and extended up to 1.5 km beyond its present position c. 2 ka (figure 4) (Yamagata et al, 2002), based upon a till (moraine labelled '?' in table 2) found between the SH5 (c.2.6 ka) and KS1 (c.1.8 ka) tephra layers; and that West Ichinsky Glacier advanced ~4 km beyond its current margin c. 1.5 ka (figure 4), based upon a till found between the KS1 (c.1.8 ka) and OP (c.1.4 ka) tephra layers (table 2) (Yamagata et al 2000(Yamagata et al , 2002.…”

“…There is also evidence that Bilchenok Glacier advanced and extended up to 1.5 km beyond its present position c. 2 ka (figure 4) (Yamagata et al, 2002), based upon a till (moraine labelled '?' in table 2) found between the SH5 (c.2.6 ka) and KS1 (c.1.8 ka) tephra layers; and that West Ichinsky Glacier advanced ~4 km beyond its current margin c. 1.5 ka (figure 4), based upon a till found between the KS1 (c.1.8 ka) and OP (c.1.4 ka) tephra layers (table 2) (Yamagata et al 2000(Yamagata et al , 2002. In addition, Bilchenok and Koryto glaciers extended beyond their current margins by ~3 km and 2 km, respectively, at c.1 ka (figure 4).…”

“…In this instance, a group of moraines (see 'Event A' moraines in table 2) is found to be draped by the Ksudach-2 (KS2) tephra (6.8 ka) (table 1), reflecting the former presence a glacier up to 3.5 km long sometime prior to this period (figure 4). Finally, Yamagata et al (2000Yamagata et al ( , 2002, find evidence for the advance (between 3 and 8 km) of Bilchenok (part of the Klyuchevskaya group of glaciers), West Ichinsky (~55.693°N, 157.658°E), and Koryto (~54.846°N, 161.758°E) glaciers sometime prior to 8.5-9.0 ka (see figure 1 for site locations) (figure 4). At Bilchenok and Koryto, this advance is reflected by a till layer found beneath the Kizimen (KZ) tephra (c. 8.3 ka) (table 1), whilst at West Ichinsky, the till layer is found beneath the KHG tephra (c. 7.8 ka).…”

“…suggests that the absence of the OP tephra upon the innermost of these moraines ('Event C' moraines in table 2), reflects their deposition during the past 1.4 ka (figure 4). Yamagata et al (2000Yamagata et al ( , 2002 find evidence that Bilchenok, West Ichinsky, and Koryto glaciers, advanced beyond their present margins by ~3, 6.5 and 3.5 km, respectively, at c. 3 ka. For each of these glaciers, this age constraint is based upon a till found between the Khangar (KHG) (c. 7.8 ka) and Shiveluch 5 (SH5) (c.2.6 ka) tephra layers (table 2).…”

“…Leonov and Kobrenkov, 2003;Barr and Clark, 2011), or past millennium (e.g. Solomina et al, 1995Solomina et al, , 2007Yamaguchi et al, 2008), and few investigations have focused upon the Holocene as a whole Yamagata et al, 2000Yamagata et al, , 2002, despite Kamchatka offering one of the bestresolved Holocene tephra sequences anywhere in the world Ponomareva et al, 2007Ponomareva et al, , 2013. With this in mind, the purpose of this paper is to summarise current understanding of Holocene glacier fluctuations upon the Kamchatka Peninsula (Solomina et al, 1995(Solomina et al, , 2007Savoskul and Zech, 1997;Yamagata et al, 2002;Solomina et al, 2007;Yamaguchi et al, 2008), and to place this information in a wider palaeoglacial and palaeoclimatic context.…”