Radiocarbon Analyses of Modern Organics at Monte Verde, Chile: No Evidence for a Local Reservoir Effect

Radiocarbon measurements have been obtained on contemporary plant samples collected at the site of Monte Verde, Chile, to examine the possibility that a local l4 C reservoir effect impinges on the accuracy of the l4 C values obtained on previously recovered archaeological samples. The l4 C activity of the modern plants do not reveal any offset from expected contemporary l4 C values and thus provide no support for a major postulated reservoir effect at least for the recent past. Although there is, at present, no direct means of measuring potential l4 C reservoir offsets in the late Pleistocene for this region, we are not aware of any current data that would indicate that there have been major changes during geologically recent times.