Significance of correspondence between river discharge and proloculus size of benthic foraminifera in paleomonsoonal studies

Abstract

Variations in the mean proloculus size (MPS) of the benthic foraminiferal species Rotalidium annectens were studied in a core collected off Karwar (20 m water depth), on the west coast of India. Comparison of downcore variations in the MPS with rainfall (five-year average) over a period of 100 years from the catchment area of the Kali River shows a direct correlation. This implies that higher MPS values indicate high rainfall over the catchment area and thus confirms the earlier hypothesis that the MPS is inversely related to salinity. The correspondence between MPS and rainfall shows a high potential in generating proximity data for the reconstruction of a paleo-precipitational history