This is a picture of the beach near Montauk Point

on Long Island. Usually rocks on a beach are well

rounded by wave action. These are not. Where
could they have come from?
This valley is in North Cascades National Park in
Washington. What shape is this valley, and what
gave it the shape?
This picture shows two types of
rocks on a mountaintop in
northern New Jersey. This is a
large boulder of a layered
sandstone (a sedimentary rock)
resting on granite bedrock (an
igneous rock). Sandstone, like
this boulder, is found on a
mountain about 30 miles away.
How this boulder might get
here?
Glaciers and Glaciation
Geography 12
 Glaciers
• Glaciers are part of:
• Water cycle
• Rock cycle
• Glacier – a thick mass of ice that flows. It
originates on land from the accumulation,
compaction, and recrystallization of snow
• Glaciers form in areas where more snow falls in
winter than melts during the summer
• ~ 2% of the world’s water is tied up in glaciers
Glaciers: What if they all melted?
– Antarctic ice sheet alone
• 80% of the world’s ice
• 2/3 of Earth’s fresh water
• 1.5 times the area of USA
• If melted, sea level would
rise 60 to 70 meters
 Glaciers of the past
• Ice Age
• The Ice Age began 2-3 million years ago
• Most of the major glacial stages occurred
during a division of geologic time called the
Pleistocene epoch
• There have been many glacial advances
(glaciations) and glacial retreats
(interglacials)
– Eccentricity: The shape of the Earth’s orbit varies
from nearly circular to more elongated (elliptical)
and back to circular about every 100,000 years.
• Axial tilt: The tilt of the Earth’s axis varies
between 21.5º & 24.5º over a period of about
41,000 years.
• Precession: The circular motion of the
Earth’s axis traces a complete circle in
space every 26,000 years.
 Formation of glacial ice
• 1) Snowflakes become
smaller, thicker, and
rounder, air is forced
out
• 2) Snow is
recrystallized into a
much denser mass of
small grains called firn
• 3) Once the ice is 50 m
thick, firn fuses into a
solid mass of
interlocking ice
crystals – glacial ice
• Firn

• Glacial ice
 Movement of glacial ice
– Internal plastic flow
• Some parts of the ice move
farther than others
• Under pressure, ice behaves
as a plastic material
• Like squeezing toothpaste
– Basal slip
• Entire ice mass slipping
along the ground
• Lubricated by thin layer of
water at base melted under
pressure
• Like pushing a box across
the floor
Movement of glacial ice

• Zone of fracture
– Occurs in the top
50 meters
– Tension causes
crevasses (cracks)
to form in brittle
ice
– Don’t fall in!
Crevasse field
 Review-The glacial budget
• Zone of accumulation: More snowfall than melting in upper
1/3 of glacier
• Zone of wastage: More melting than snowfall in lower 2/3
of glacier
• Snowline: snowfall = melting, divides zones
Glacier Zones
A Moving River of Ice

Zone of Snow and firn

accumulation
Glacier ice

Equilibrium
line

Zone of ablation

Glacier ice ablated during melting season

 Glacier types
– Valley (alpine) glaciers
– In mountainous areas
– Flows down a valley from a zone of accumulation at its head
– Long and narrow
– Continental Glaciers (Ice sheets)
– Cover large areas
– Flow outward from an accumulation center
Alpine or Valley Glaciers
Valley Glacier
Continental Glacier
Ellesmere Island, Canada
 Erosion by glaciers
• Abrasion: polish or striations
• Plucking: frost shattering
 Receding Glacier

1957 1980
 Erosional features
• Cirque: Bowl-shaped depression at head of
valley
• Arete: Sharp ridge separating cirques
• Horn: Steep peak where aretes meet
• U shaped valleys: young V shaped river
valleys are carved into wide U shaped
valleys
• Hanging Valleys: formed when tributary
glaciers flow into main glaciers
• Fjords: are U shaped valleys flooded by
sea water
 Hanging valley – Milford Sound, NZ
• U-shaped
The Matterhorn in the Swiss Alps
 Depositional features
• Glacial till is unstratified (no layers) and unsorted
Glacial depositional features
 Moraines
• Deposits of till along
the edges of a glacier
– Terminal (end)
moraine – at foot
of glacier
– Lateral moraine –
deposited along
side of glacier
– Medial moraine –
between two
glaciers
 Glacial deposits: Stratified
Outwash plains
• Stratified (layered) sand and gravel deposited by meltwater
leaving a glacier, not directly by the glacier.
Erratics: Isolated rocks
deposited by glaciers
• Kame
• Small, cone-shaped
hills and terraces
formed at the edge
of the glacier by
meltwater pouring
sediment off the
glacier’s surface.
• Deposits are
typically stratified
(layered)
 Glacial deposits
• Drumlins
– Made of till
– Smooth, tear-
shaped hills
parallel to
direction of
glacial
movement
– Steep side faces
the direction
from which the
ice advanced