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In situ cosmogenic nuclides are an important tool for quantifying landscape evolution and dating fossil-bearing deposits in the Cradle of Humankind (CoH), South Africa. This technique mainly employs cosmogenic 10-Beryllium (Be-10) in river sediments to estimate denudation rates and the ratio of 26-Aluminium (Al-26) to Be-10 (Al-26/Be-10), to constrain ages of sediment burial. Here, we use Be-10 and Al-26 concentrations in bedrock and soil above the Rising Star Cave (the discovery site of Homo naledi) to constrain the denudation rate and the exposure history of soil on the surface. Apparent Be-10-derived denudation rates obtained from pebble- to cobble-sized clasts and coarse-sand in soil (on average 3.59 +/- 0.27 m/Ma and 3.05 +/- 0.25 m/Ma, respectively) are 2-3 times lower than the bedrock denudation rates (on average 9.46 +/- 0.68 m/Ma). In addition, soil samples yield an average Al-26/Be-10 ratio (5.12 +/- 0.27) that is significantly lower than the surface production ratio of 6.75, which suggests complex exposure histories. These results are consistent with prolonged surface residence of up to 1.5 Ma in vertically mixed soils that are up to 3 m thick. We conclude that the Be-10 concentrations accumulated in soils during the long near-surface residence times can potentially cause underestimation of single-nuclide (Be-10) catchment-wide denudation rates in the CoH. Further, burial ages of cave sediment samples that consist of an amalgamation of sand-size quartz grains could be overestimated if a pre-burial Al-26/Be-10 ratio calculated from the surface production is assumed.

Mountain rivers respond to strong earthquakes by rapidly aggrading to accommodate excess sediment delivered by co-seismic landslides. Detailed sediment budgets indicate that rivers need several years to decades to recover from seismic disturbances, depending on how recovery is defined. We examine three principal proxies of river recovery after earthquake-induced sediment pulses around Pokhara, Nepal's second largest city. Freshly exhumed cohorts of floodplain trees in growth position indicate rapid and pulsed sedimentation that formed a fan covering 150 km2 in a Lesser Himalayan basin with tens of metres of debris between the 11th and 15th centuries AD. Radiocarbon dates of buried trees are consistent with those of nearby valley deposits linked to major medieval earthquakes, such that we can estimate average rates of re-incision since. We combine high-resolution digital elevation data, geodetic field surveys, aerial photos, and dated tree trunks to reconstruct geomorphic marker surfaces. The volumes of sediment relative to these surfaces require average net sediment yields of up to 4200 t km–2 yr–1 for the 650 years since the last inferred earthquake-triggered sediment pulse. The lithological composition of channel bedload differs from that of local bedrock, confirming that rivers are still mostly evacuating medieval valley fills, locally incising at rates of up to 0.2 m yr–1. Pronounced knickpoints and epigenetic gorges at tributary junctions further illustrate the protracted fluvial response; only the distal portions of the earthquake-derived sediment wedges have been cut to near their base. Our results challenge the notion that mountain rivers recover speedily from earthquakes within years to decades. The valley fills around Pokhara show that even highly erosive Himalayan rivers may need more than several centuries to adjust to catastrophic perturbations. Our results motivate some rethinking of post-seismic hazard appraisals and infrastructural planning in active mountain regions.