Tertiary Vegetation and Climate History of the Murray Basin

Murray Basin paleoecological data describes vegetation shifts and precipitation changes from the early Tertiary to the Pleistocene. The analysis, published by the Australian Ocean Data Network, examines pollen assemblages and stratigraphic horizons. The record was last updated in April 2026.

Use Cases

• Analyze pollen content like chenopod and Asteraceae to reconstruct past salt-marsh environments during marine transgressions.
• Use the Nothofagus phase as a stratigraphic marker to correlate climate wetness with regional marine transgression events.
• Study shifts from rainforest to eucalypt wet sclerophyll forest to infer changes in fire regimes and precipitation patterns.
• Compare Tertiary and early Pleistocene salinity indicators with modern data to assess the historical absence of dryland salinity.

Strengths

• Provides a multi-million-year temporal sequence from the early Tertiary to the early Pleistocene.
• Identifies specific, well-defined stratigraphic horizons like the Nothofagus phase for correlation.

Limitations

• Data is presented in narrative PDF/HTML format, not as structured, machine-readable tables.
• Geographic coverage is focused on the Murray Basin and western slopes of the Eastern Highlands.
• Sample size and quantitative data metrics like row counts are unavailable.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network.

Collection Method

Scientific analysis of paleoecological and stratigraphic evidence.

Time Range

Late Cainozoic (Tertiary to early Pleistocene).

Freshness

Updated April 2026.

Geography

Murray Basin and western slopes of the Eastern Highlands, Australia.