Glaciers have had an enormous effect on the planet we call Earth. People marvel and stare in awe at the beauty of the Rocky Mountains, others spend their time relaxing on the shores of Lake Superior, and others spend their time skiing down the slopes of the Alps. People do these things but never wonder where these things came from.

Right now we are still living in the Great Ice Age. Although it is one third less than it was years ago, ice still covers approximately ten percent of the land's surface. Glaciers are a product and play a major part in our world's climate. Almost one fifth of the land we have today in our world looks the way it does because of eroding, transporting, and deposition of soils and sediments. In some cases, glaciers have taken beneficial soil from one area and transported it to another area where it can be used more effici

Once the glacier has transported the sediments and rock fragments it deposits them along the way. The term glacial drift refers to "all the rock material transported and deposited by glaciers" (Pearl 134). Glacial till is "Haphazardly accumulated drift, with little semblance of sorting or layering (which require the influence of water)" (Pearl 134). Moraines are drift that has been laid down in a recognizable pattern, mostly linear. There are different types of moraines, such as Ground, End, and Lateral Moraines. These are classified by their position to the glacier. Kames are irregularly shaped cones or mounds of layered sand and gravel. These often occur in clusters. Nobody really knows how these are formed (Croneis 98). Eskers are long narrow winding ridges of poorly sorted sands and gravels that may go on for miles (Pearl 134-135). "The most outstanding feature of ice deposits is that they are unsorted" (Croneis 97). Glacier till is a heterogeneous deposit, which means it is not sorted, unlike what a river does. The only way for the sediments to be sorted is to have the meltwater sort them as it runs off the glacier. These deposits are called glacialfluvial deposits (Croneis 99).

Glaciation is a period in time when there is a very high number glaciers, this is also know as an Ice Age. Glaciation can also be defined by the amount of glaciers that grow and advance down slope at a faster rate than glaciers that melting. At this point in time we are coming out of a period of glaciation. Nobody knows for sure what the main cause of glaciation is but there are several theories that are debated upon (Pearl 127).

The second kind of glacier is called a Piedmont Glacier. These glaciers are formed when a Valley Glacier reaches the bottom of the mountain and is no longer restricted by the valley so the glacier begins to spread out to form an apron shape (Pearl 130). The largest piedmont glacier covers eight-thousand square kilometers and is one-hundred ninety-three kilometers across ("Information" 1)

There are three main types of glaciers, Valley Glaciers, Piedmont Glaciers, and Continental Glaciers. Glaciers may appear blue due to the dense ice ("Information" 2).

The movement of glaciers is not fully understood. Glacier movement is basically due to the plasticity of the deeper levels of ice in the zone of flow; the lower ice carries along the upper, brittle ice in the zone of fracture. Glacial movement is furthered by melting and refreezing and by expansion and contraction caused by slight changes in temperature. (Pearl 129)

The final kind of erosion is called Ice-Sheet Erosion. Since ice sheets are much more massive than other glaciers the effects are much more drastic. In some places the solid rock mantel of the earth has been completely stripped away (Pearl 132-133).

One of the important attributes of a glacier is that it is able to pick up sediments as it moves down slope; this is called erosion. There are four kinds of erosion, they are: Valley-Head Erosion, Valley-Wall Erosion, Valley-Floor Erosion, and Ice Sheet erosion (Pearl 131).

" Glaciation is responsible for the origin of more lakes than are all other causes combined. Innumerable lakes occur in recently glaciated parts of the Northern Hemisphere. They are found in scoured rock basins; in the areas hemmed in by terminal, lateral, and ground moraines; in valleys blocked off by moraines; and in basins or valleys

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Approximate Word count = 2297
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)