Neogene paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic change in southern temperate ecosystems — a southern perspective

Abstract

Recently, a greatly increased number of macrofossil and pollen analytical records from Australasia and southern South America has permitted, for the first time, a comprehensive overview of past vegetation and climate change in southern temperate ecosystems. While the course of Neogene climatic change has been comparable to that of the temperate northern hemisphere, a distinctive southern hemisphere vegetation has evolved, not primarily because of its common Gondwana origin, but as a consequence of the minor amplitude of Quaternary change, absence of large ice sheets, and failure of full-glacial environments to persist through interglacials.