The Paleolake Tehuelche is the name for several former lakes that existed in the area of Torres del Paine in southern Patagonia.[1] These were proglacial lakes that existed next to the Patagonian Ice Sheet during the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene.[1][2] Some of the evidence of the lakes stem from lake terraces observable at present but these is some uncertainty on which terraces are associated to which lake or lake stage.[1]
About 38,000 years BP an early Paleolake Tehuelche existed and drained eastward through Turbio River. The surface of this lake was 250 to 280 m a.s.l.[1]
A particular lake named Great Tehuelche Paleolake covered what is now Sarmiento and Del Toro lakes plus a large area to east making Cazador Range a peninsula[2] until about 7,113 years BP when the lake drained and ceased to exist.[2]
References
- ^ a b c d García, Juan-Luis; Hall, Brenda L.; Kaplan, Michael R.; Vega, Rodrigo M.; Strelin, Jorge A. (2014). "Glacial geomorphology of the Torres del Paine region (southern Patagonia): Implications for glaciation, deglaciation and paleolake history". Geomorphology. 204: 599–616. Bibcode:2014Geomo.204..599G. doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2013.08.036.
- ^ a b c Solari, Marcelo A.; Le Roux, Jacobus P.; Hervé, Francisco; Airo, Alessandro; Calderón, Mauricio (2012). "Evolution of the Great Tehuelche Paleolake in the Torres del Paine National Park of Chilean Patagonia during the Last Glacial Maximum and Holocene" (PDF). Andean Geology. 39 (1): 1–21. doi:10.5027/andgeoV39N1-a01.