Glaciers

What is a glacier?
A thick ice mass that forms above the
snowline over hundreds or thousands of
years.

Valley Glaciers
Move down
mountain
valleys
Associated with
a V-shape

Continental Glaciers / Ice

Sheets
Very Large ice
masses
Flow in all directions;
cover everything but
the highest land.
Cover Greenland and
Antarctica

Movement
Movement is called
Flow
Plastic flow:
movement within ice
Basal slip: movement
due to gravity
Calving: large pieces
break off the front

Icebergs are different from

glaciers.

Glaciers form
where more snow
falls than can
melt in the
summer

Erosion
Many places were changed by glaciers of
the last ice age
Plucking: moving of rocks
Abrasion

Landforms: Toughs and

Valleys
Glacial
trough: is a Ushaped valley
that was once
V-shaped but
was deepen by
a glacier.

Landforms: Cirque
Cirque: is a
bowl-shaped
depression at
the head of a
glacial valley.

Landforms: Artes and Horns

Artes: Snaking, sharp-edged ridges
Horns: sharp pyramid-like peaks that are
above the mountain landscape

Moraines
Layers or ridges of till left behind when
glaciers melt

Kettle
Depressions and small lakes formed due
to stagnant ice becoming buried and
eventually melting
Walden Pond in Massachusetts