THE CAROLINA BAYS

Stratigraphy of Big Bay:



The physical relationship of Pleistocene sand dunes to Big Bay, North Carolina, and an adjacent Carolina Bays further demonstrates that they are tens of thousands of years old (Brooks et al. 2001). In this case, during the Pleistocene sand dunes have migrated from the valley wall of the Wateree River into and partially filled Big Bay and an adjacent Carolina Bay. According to basic principles of cross-cutting relationships and superposition, both Carolina Bays were first created and the sand dunes later migrated into them. Thus, the sand dunes must be younger the Carolina Bays. Since the sand dunes have been dated by OSL dating at 29,600±2,4000 to 33,200±2,800 BP, both Carolina Bays must be older than these dates.






Palynology:



The sequence of pollen zones recovered from cores taken from various Carolina Bays Frey (1953, 1955), Watt (1980), and Whitehead (1964, 1981) document the presence of full glacial pollen zones within the sediments filling Carolina Bays. The thick sediments, which were recovered in these cores and contain pollen characteristic of full glacial conditions could only have accumulated within these Carolina Bays only if they had existed prior to end of the last glacial epoch.

The radiocarbon dates reported by Frey (1953, 1955), Watts (1980), and Whitehead (1964, 1981) from these Carolina Bay cores fully collaborate both the glacial age of the pollen and the undisturbed nature of the sediments filling these Carolina Bays as indicated by the reported layering of the sediments filling them and increasing age with depth of the pollen they contain.

Within cores of undisturbed sediments recovered from Big Bay, North Carolina, Brook et al. (2001) documented well-defined pollen zones consisting of distinct pollen assemblages. They found a stratigraphically consistent series of pollen zones, which increased in age consistently with depth from Holocene interglacial epoch to the Wisconsinan glacial epoch, back into Oxygen Isotope Stage 5, 75,000 to 134,000 years BP. These pollen zones collaborate the dating of Big Bay by OSL and radiocarbon dating.