`Little Ice Age' glaciation and current glaciers in the Iberian Peninsula

Abstract

`Little Ice Age' (LIA) glacier advance has been registered in three of the main Iberian high mountain areas: Pyrenees, Picos de Europa and Sierra Nevada. During the LIA, three different glacial environments have been differentiated in these three ranges. A high mountain glacial environment exists in the Pyrenees, where the altitude and northern latitude developed the most complex glacial environment between the oceanic influence on the western side and the Mediterranean influence on the eastern side. In the Pyrenees the LIA glaciation occurred in 15 massifs where there are up to 100 cirques; however, today the glaciers remain only in the highest peaks. A marginal glacial environment exists in the Picos de Europa related to the oceanic influence and topography in an Atlantic high mountain: there were six glaciers in the Picos de Europa Massif during the LIA. A marginal glacial environment also exists in the Sierra Nevada, related to the northern orientation and altitude in a Mediterranean high mountain, where only one glacier, the southernmost of Europe, occurred during the LIA. Several variations of LIA glaciers have been found: historical maximum (from the end of the seventeenth to the beginning of the eighteenth centuries); minor retreat with secondary regrowth (mid-eighteenth to nineteenth centuries); and continuous retreat (from the end of the nineteenth to the beginning of the twentieth centuries); followed by the almost complete extinction of the glaciers and an increase in the periglacial environment. There are now 29 glaciers in the Pyrenees, four buried icepatches in the Picos de Europa and one buried icepatch in the Sierra Nevada. The rise of ELAs from the last LIA glacial maximum until the present allows the calculation of an increase in temperatures of around 0.9°C in the Iberian high mountains.