Climate sensitive organic proxies, like the distribution and isotopic composition of plant-wax lipids provide information on climatic changes in the catchment areas of the Incomati, Matola, and Lusutfu rivers. At the transition between glacials and interglacials, shifts in vegetation correlate with changes in sea surface temperature in the Agulhas current. The local hydrology, however, does not follow these orbital-paced shifts. Instead, precipitation patterns follow millennial scale variations with different forcing mechanisms in glacial versus interglacial climatic states.

GeoB20616-1 organic geochemical down-core data. n-Alkane isotopic composition and distribution descriptive parameters averaged. The elevated CPI values ranging from 3.8 to 14 indicate that the nalkanes within the terrestrial and marine samples were likely derived from nondegraded, terrestrial, higher plant material (Eglinton & Hamilton, 1967). We focus the discussion on the isotopic signals of the n-C31 alkane but note that the n-C29 and n-C33 alkanes reveal similar trends.