Unique Baltic Outcrops Reveal Millennia of Ecological Changes

Throughout Earth's history, tectonic forces, often violent and unpredictable, have been responsible for exposing geological formations to scientific scrutiny. But forces of uplift are not restricted to plate boundaries. For example, when looking at forested coastal dunes bordering placid Curonian Lagoon along the Lithuanian coast of the Baltic Sea, one hardly suspects that any powerful forces are at work. Yet this is a site where massive migrating hills of sand have put pressure on the deep strata of the ancient lagoon, forcing its sediments to the surface and offering rare access to fossils of the Holocene, which spans the past 10,000 years.