The Flandrian began as the relatively short-lived Younger Dryas climate downturn came to an end.
The Flandrian is traditionally seen as the latest warm interglacial in a series that has been occurring throughout the Quaternary geological period.
Fjords were formed during the Flandrian transgression when U-shaped glaciated valleys were inundated.
[3] However, orbital cycles are not the only influence on global temperature; atmospheric greenhouse gases also affect the radiative forcing.
While there is agreement that post-Industrial Revolution greenhouse gas emissions are substantially warming the planet, there is debate over whether early agriculture, beginning thousands of years earlier, has had a much smaller warming effect (due to methane emissions from rice paddies, or deforestation, for instance).