Applied Geomorphology

marks

• lab work, attendance 30%
• midterm 20%
• final 50%

• TA Tanya Kampherm ESC 304 x36495 tskamphe@uwaterloo.ca

Geologic Processes

• ice erodes, transports, deposits stuff = glacial till (unsorted, heterogeneous)
  • almost 2km of ice over southern Ontario during last ice age
• water sorts (small stuff to bigger stuff = suspended load, saltation (carried a bit, bounce), rolling/sliding)
• wind sorts (small stuff to bigger stuff = suspension, saltation, creep)
  • sand dunes
• gravity sorts a bit (eg talus slopes)

Pattern Elements

• vegetation
  • woodlots: sharp boundaries, may exist since valley or wildlife corridor
  • wetlands: black is open water, white are grass/sedge (deep organics)
• agriculture
  • cultivated fields: plow lines, sometimes x-ish pattern
  • countour farming: hilly
  • orchards: grid, well drained eg sandy soil
  • vineyards: regular rows, sensitive microclimate, note diff fields
  • tobacco: striped (plant rotation); drying huts on the edges, well drained = sandy soil
  • fences/hedgegrows: trees/bushes and/or piled rocks along edges; pathways for small animals
  • barns/silos/farmhouses: usually protected from wind by trees; lane to house
  • greenhouses: long buildings (therefore on cheap land)
• industrial
  • buried pipeline
  • sewage treatment facility: multiple large pools, may see white dots (aerators)
  • big manufacturing plants
  • sanitary landfills: raised mound, road to active cell; ratio 4 garbage: 1 soil
  • liquid storage: piles of barrels (fenced in) by buildings
  • airports/airstrips: terminal, garage, walkways to garage; in northern Canada usually on well-drained (sandy) soil
  • highways/roads: note access points (eg controlled access)
  • railways: rail lines, embankment
  • bridges: shadows are good clue
  • pits: irregular/jagged edges, access roads
  • quarries: in bedrock, regular & vertical edges, piles of material inside
  • apartment buildings: balconies, main entrance, if no parking assume underground
• urban stuff
  • mobile home parks: smaller buildings than subdivisions
  • gas stations/garages: gas islands, on corners, garage building, tanks leak
  • schools: large building, flat roof, portables, playing field & track
  • cemeteries: curved roads, no parking, one entrance
  • shopping centre: flat roof, near intersection, lots of parking
  • subdivision
  • auto junkyard: owners can drive around yard..
  • golf course: fairways etc
• accordancy: hilltops at same elevation
• surface drainage
  • dendritic: flat-lying, fine-grained, homogenous material
  • trellis: more angularity, parallelism; indicate gently dipping sedimentary rocks, structural control in shallow bedrock
  • radial: hill
  • parallel: smooth & sloping plain; uniform overburden or parallel control from bedrock
  • annular: around and away from hill =(_)=
  • rectangular: more random, bedrock control
• gullies
  • v-shaped: coarse granular soil (sand/gravel)
  • u-shaped: silty soil; cohesion; cliff-like sides
  • saucer-shaped: clays
  • compound gullies from bedded materials
• grey tones
  • generally lows are darker than highs
  • wet (high water table) and poor surface drainage areas darker than dry, well-drained areas
  • mottled tones usually due to moisture diff; thciker/wetter topsoil=darker
  • freshly-cut/disturbed soils are lighter

Quaternary landform origins

• till sheet/ground moraine
  • formed under glacier, stuff moved short distance and compacted
  • sag and swell relief (mottled), glacial grooving, erratics, dendritic drainage, dish-shaped gullies, in Canada usually farmland
  • may be thin lenses of grandular material (carrys groundwater), fairly impermeable, fairly uniform, excavation good except for boulders, have optimum moisture, silty clay/sand, borderline to non-frost successful, can be difficult to dig, high shear strength (good bearings for footings), few foundation problems, low permeability, poor granular potential, desicated crack fractures, usually low environmental sensitivity
  • white-laces gullies in US's Illinoian ground morains
• drumlins: usually in groups (same orientation), usually compact glacial till around core (till/rock/stratified drift)
• end morains
  • topography hummocky/irregular, small hills, elongated ridges, drainage disordered, many ponds, poor surface drainage, locally severe erosion, varied tones, local wetlands
  • unpredictable/variable stratigraphy, good earth burrow, borderline to non-frost suseptable, potential aquifer,uw usually low aggregates (sometimes locally good), good pathway for contaminents, groundwater recharge, some parts sorted due to later ablation
• ablation till: melt-out, till, etc
• recessional morains = many end morains
  • cyclic cooling/warming during ablation
  • called deguer(?) morains if underwater
• interlobate (kame) moraine: multiple ice lobes meet and retreat
• outwash plains
  • called valley trains when deposited in existing valley
  • may be pittled with kettles
• eskers
• kames