The Late Devensian Lateglacial palaeoenvironmental record from Whitrig Bog, SE Scotland. 1. Lithostratigraphy, geochemistry and palaeobotany

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Abstract
This is the first of a series of articles presenting the results of a multi‐proxy investigation aimed at reconstructing changes in the ecosystem and climate of Whitrig Bog, SE Scotland, during the last glacial‐inter‐glacial transition (Devensian Lateglacial, c. 14–10 ka BP). We present here the results from sediment lithology, chemistry, pollen, and plant macrofossil analyses. These data are used to infer the nature of the local catchment soils and both local and regional terrestrial vegetation. The interstadial period (c. 13–11 ka BP) is characterized by a successional sequence developing from a landscape with bare, poorly developed minerogenic soils supporting a sparse herbaceous flora into open birch woodland with juniper scrub and stable organic soils. At c. 11 ka BP the Younger Dryas climatic cooling event caused an abrupt reversion to an open herbaceous arctic/alpine flora (e.g. macrofossil evidence of Silene furcata and Oxyria digyna) and high levels of minerogenic erosion into the basin, indicating environmental response to a cold Arctic climate. In addition to this Younger Dryas climatic reversal, two lesser reversion episodes occurred earlier during the interstadial. The more pronounced of the two, late in the intersladial, is characterized by high levels of erosion and a change from birch/juniper woodland to an open herbaceous flora. The older oscillation occurs approximately mid‐way through the interstadial sequence and is marked by similar pollen changes, albeit shorter lived and more subtle.