Star Carr time period Mesolithic
General information
Environmental context
Star Carr now lies under farmland at the eastern end of the Vale of Pickering. During the Mesolithic the site was near the outflow at the western end of a palaeolake, known as Lake Flixton. At the end of the last ice age a combination of glacial and post-glacial geomorphology caused the area to drain to the west (away from the shortest-distance to the North Sea at Filey). The basin filled by Lake Flixton was probably created by glacial 'scarring'.
The site is preserved due to Lake Flixton having been in-filled with peat during the course of the Mesolithic. Waterlogged peat prevents organic finds from oxidising and has led to some of the best preservation conditions possible (such conditions have preserved the famous bog bodies found in other parts of northern Europe).
As a result of such good conditions archaeologists were able to recover bone, antler and wood in addition to the flints that are normally all that is left on sites from this period.
During the period of Mesolithic occupation the area surrounding the lake would have been a mixed forest of birch, aspen and willow. The lake edge and shallows would have been full of reeds, water lily and other aquatic plants and lake levels would have changed dynamically in response to rainfall or snow-melt.
These and many other plants would have formed the base of a complex food web. The mammals that we have evidence for include herbivores such as beaver, red deer, roe deer, elk 
, aurochs, wild boar, hare and carnivores such as wolf, lynx, bear, fox, pine marten, badger and hedgehog.
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