On the Peri-Glacial Flora of Jæren. With Notes on the Morphology of the Salix Pollen Grain

Abstract

In 1935 I published a pollen spectrum from Brøndmyra (Jæren) about which I in 1950 (p. 37) wrote that it had been interpreted as indicating extreme snow-patch vegetation dominated by Salix herbacea «and that interpretation has not been challenged so far». However, no one could realise more lively than I have done myself, that the interpretation was based upon rather indirect evidence, and that a re-examination of the spectrum in question would be desirable. Pollen analysis has made some progress since 1935 (when many workers still did not distinguish between Salixand Artemisia pollen), and the more acute morphological analysis of to-day might give information which was then concealed. I feel that if a pollen analyst should contribute to a presentation volume to our senior glaciologist, few themes could be more appropriate than this pollen spectrum from the edge of the vanishing Ice Age glacier — provided the former interpretation can still be retained.