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Dieren en planten

Water en land

Geological history   Quaternary   Saalian period   Eemian   Weichsel   Holocene   

Mens en Milieu

Overview of the Quaternary, Drawing from original made by Bert de Vries, Wieringen

Quaternary: eighteen glaciations

During the last 2.5 million years of the world's history, the climate on earth begins to fluctuate more strongly than previously. There were eighteen glaciations. During the next to last glaciation, the polar caps of the North Pole extended down to the wadden region. The pushed moraines, boulder clay and glacial erratics date back to this period. Tons of sand was transported during the last glaciation, the days when mammoths and other large animals roamed the North Sea plains.

  • Interglacial periods

    The Quaternary is divided into two epochs: the Pleistocene and Holocene. The Holocene began ten thousand years ago and continues up to the present time.
    The warm periods between two glaciations are referred to as interglacials. The North Sea dried up during the glacials, due to a worldwide decline in the sea level, up to 50 meters lower than today. The sea level rose during the interglacials and the North Sea filled up with water.
    The present period, Holocene, is also an interglacial. That means that geologists expect a new ice age in the future!