Glacier Erosion
Glaciers wear down the landscape; by picking up and carrying debris that moves across the land along with the ice.
Glaciers can pick up and carry sediment that ranges in size from sand grains to boulders bigger than houses.
Moving like a conveyor belt or a bulldozer, a single glacier can move millions of tons of material!
How much erosion takes place is determined by the:
Glaciers can pick up and carry sediment that ranges in size from sand grains to boulders bigger than houses.
Moving like a conveyor belt or a bulldozer, a single glacier can move millions of tons of material!
How much erosion takes place is determined by the:
- **Sum (Glaciers are massive!)
- Slope
- Speed
- Surface
The wide range of easily recognized landscapes features produced by the action of glaciers and ice sheets include many classic landforms including continental and valley glaciers, moraines, aretes, cirques, horns, U-shaped valley/ hanging valley, outwash plain, till (Eratics), Drumlins, and eskers. These landforms, which span scales from millimeters to kilometers, result from different patterns of rock loss.