Glacial depositional landforms

Glacial depositional landforms

This section of the website includes many examples of landforms created underneath and around the margins of glaciers. These depositional landforms typically form in two domains: subglacial landforms and ice-marginal landforms.

Subglacial landforms include:

  • A continuum of lineated bedforms, ranging from small scale (flutes), through to intermediate scale (10s of metres; Drumlins), through to large scale (kilometres; Megascale glacial lineations).
  • Sediments and landforms associated with meltwater, such as eskers.

Ice-marginal landforms include:

  • Piles of debris formed at the ice margin, such as moraines;
  • Till plains formed underneath the ice sheet;
  • Fluvioglacial landforms such as kames, outwash plains, meltwater channels.

There are lots of examples of these types of landforms across the Patagonian Ice Sheet and the British Ice Sheet, both during the Younger Dryas (11,000 years ago) and Last Glacial Maximum (21,000 years ago).

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