Magnetostratigraphy of Cave Sediments: Application and Limits

The application of the magnetostratigraphy for dating of clastic and chemogenic cave sediments has been limited by the complex conditions underground and the lack of age constraints on these deposits for correlation with geomagnetic polarity timescale (GPTS). Without age constraints any correlation of obtained results cannot be explicit. Additionally, the dynamic character of cave infilling, exhumation and fossilisation expressed by unconformities within preserved sedimentary profiles can hide a substantial part of the geological time. The detailed internal division of deposits (breaks in deposition and related processes) and scarcity of fossils make the correlation of obtained magnetostratigraphic log with geomagnetic polarity timescales sometimes problematic. The analytical results confirmed that the complete step/field procedure offered by demagnetisation methods must be applied. The application of complete analysis only to pilot samples and shortened, selected field/step approach, to other samples did not offer sufficient data set for reliable interpretation.