Testing the climatic significance of dropstones: an example from southeast Spain

Abstract

Dropstones are clasts which pose a hydrodynamic paradox or which have an exotic lithology with uncertain provenance. Dropstones are usually associated with glacial processes and have recently been used to substantiate the presence of cool climatic phases in the geological record. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate, using an example from southeast Spain, that dropstones can be unreliable palaeoclimatic indicators, and that greater care is required in their interpretation.