Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1998, Qupperneq 259

ELDRI HOLOSENAR RANNSÓKNIR ÚR SAKSUNARDALI
OG UPPRUNIN TIL TAÐ FØROYSKA BIOTA
265
fauna is capable of flight, although the lists
do include the large flightless weevil
Otiorhynchus nodosus, which, although
pathenogenic (Lindroth et ai, 1973), is un-
likely to have been casually dispersed dur-
ing the early Holocene. It is also present,
with other flightless beetles, in Iceland
(Buckland et al., 1986b) before landnám.
Rather than survival in refugia or casual in-
dividual dispersal, a single dispersal event
in the early Holocene which introduced the
bulk of the pre-landnám biota still appears
the better solution to the origins of North
Atlantic island biota.
The above sentiments are likely to apply
to the flora also. The Saksunardalur palae-
oflora is not dissimilar to that reported from
elsewhere in the Faroes (Jóhansen, 1985),
nor from either Iceland (Hallsdóttir, 1987;
Rundgren, 1997) or Shetland (Bennett et
al., 1992). The fossil taxa include those
types which became typical of grazed areas
after landnám (e.g. Lamiaceae, Angelica,
Potentilla, Rumex acetosa and Ranunculus
acris). There are unlikely to be any ele-
ments here that could not have arrived via
ice-rafting or avian transport of propagules.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Andy Dugmore who collected
the 1998 monolith from Saksunardalur and Robert
Craigie who assisted with the pollen analysis.
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