A MIS 3 SILVER BLUFF SHORELINE - FACT OR FICTION

Of the final three Quaternary age shorelines or "marine terraces" - Holocene, Silver Bluff and Princess Anne - identified on the Georgia coast, the Silver Bluff shoreline is the most problemmatic. When it was first defined the Silver Bluff shoreline was considered to be a late Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3 highstand ca. 25 kybp. Recent studies of relative sea level (RSL) and age, have called this chronological placement into question. Data from sediment cores and the chronometric studies, using optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) and AMS-radiocarbon techniques, agree with current models for RSL in the South Atlantic - Georgia Bight. These data place the Sliver Bluff highstand earlier in MIS 3, ca. 36 kybp. Paleontological evidence, both invertebrate and vertebrate, are presented in support of this chronologic placement of the Silver Bluff highstand.