Trifoliate Seeds Below Ice
Archived: 17 September 2026
31,442 BCE lies within Marine Isotope Stage 3, a climatically unstable Late Pleistocene interval for which precise annual dating is impossible. At Derryvree, County Fermanagh, organic freshwater sediments between glacial tills indicate locally ice-free tundra, with dwarf willow, mountain avens, sedges, mosses and bogbean. Southern Irish caves preserve remains of reindeer, mammoth, hyaena, bear, fox, hare and lemmings, although their chronology and associations require caution. A possibly tool-marked Castlepook reindeer bone suggests, but cannot confirm, human visitation. Later ice expansion destroyed much evidence, leaving sediment, seeds and bones as fragmentary records of cold ecosystems in Ireland and possible human contact.