The Work of Ice
Ice Age Europe
The impact, over the last million years or so, of a series of glaciations extended across much of western Europe.
Map drawn by Stephen Hannon.Ice Age Europe
The impact, over the last million years or so, of a series of glaciations extended across much of western Europe.
Map drawn by Stephen Hannon.The most widespread glaciation built up as a dome across much of lowland Ireland. Some mountain areas, for example in Cork-Kerry and in Wicklow had their own separately-driven ice caps. A few areas, mainly in parts of the south, remained unglaciated. Some of the most striking mountain scenery has been moulded by glacial erosion, although its precise expression relates also to the geology (contrast the pointed sandstone Kerry Reeks with the gently rolling profiles of the granite mountains of Wicklow and Mourne).
The evidence of glacial erosion is widespread in many mountain areas. Over-deepened rock hollows, some of them water-filled, represent the corries or cooms, where snow first lay, thickened and nourished ice. From these locations ice advanced into and down valleys. To these locations, the ice retreated. Two of the most spectacular corries are the Devil's Punchbowl, on Mangerton Mountain in Co. Kerry, and Coomshingaun, in the Comeragh mountains of west Waterford, but these features are widely-distributed in mountain areas. In west Mayo up to sixty small corries can be counted. Near Dublin, good examples are upper and lower Lough Bray
Upper Lough Bray, near Dublin
Photo of Upper Lough Bray, near Dublin.
Courtesy of Andy B
Glendalough, Co. Wicklow
Glendalough, Co. Wicklow is an example of the U-shaped cross profile of an over deepened main valley.
Courtesy of Carsten ClasohmGlendalough, Co. Wicklow
Glendalough, Co. Wicklow is an example of the U-shaped cross profile of an over deepened main valley.
Courtesy of Carsten ClasohmAcross lowland areas, there is also evidence of glacial erosion, but there is also extensive evidence of glacial deposition. Such deposition occurred in the form of moraine, large heaps of debris pushed in front of the ice, as well debris that was held within the ice and which was dropped as the ice waned. This latter debris now constitutes the till (or boulder clay), alias the glacial drift, that covers bedrock in many parts of the country and on which are developed soils of varying levels of fertility.
Deposition also occurred from streams that ran under the ice. Across the midlands, there are the distinctive ridges known as eskers
Eskers
How parts of Ireland might have appeared after the last ice age: bare land surfaces in Iceland from which ice has recently retreated.
Courtesy of the University of Iceland
Carrauntoohil, Killarney, Co. Kerry
Photo showing Carrauntoohil, Killarney, Co. Kerry.
Courtesy of Carsten ClasohmCarrauntoohil, Killarney, Co. Kerry - Courtesy of Carsten Clasohm
Killary Harbour (Aerial View)
This is an aerial view of Killary Harbour. The long-narrow and cliff-lined inlet can be seen here.
Courtesy of Ordnance Survey Ireland.Killary Harbour (Aerial View) - Courtesy of Ordnance Survey Ireland.
Drumlins in Clew Bay, Co. Mayo
Photograph depicting the drumlins in Clew Bay, Co. Mayo. Drumlins are low hills formed and shaped by the flow of ice in the last Ice Age.
Copyright of the Geological Survey of Ireland 2006.Drumlins in Clew Bay, Co. Mayo - Copyright of the Geological Survey of Ireland 2006.
Drumlins in Clew Bay
Satellite Photo of Drumlins in Clew Bay
Courtesy of Google EarthDrumlins in Clew Bay - Courtesy of Google Earth
North of Galbally, Co. Limerick
Meltwaters of ice to the north have led to a massive channel being formed. Some water which formerly went to the Shannon now turns south to the Blackwater
Image courtesy of Cambridge University Committee for Aerial PhotographyNorth of Galbally, Co. Limerick - Image courtesy of Cambridge University Committee for Aerial Photography
Drumlins are usually about 300 metres long and perhaps 100 metres wide. They may be from 15 to 40 metres in height. Seen from a distance as from the main Dublin-Belfast road near Newry they present a rounded, rolling and quite subdued landscape with many small hills of near uniform height. This distinctive landscape has been likened to a 'basket of eggs'. Historically, the south Ulster drumlin belt has been of great significance.
The bewildering labyrinth of lakes and small hills was one reason why the Tudor English found it so difficult to take and control Ulster in the late sixteenth century. Arguably too, and certainly in the eyes of the famed Belfast geographer Emyr Estyn Evans, the drumlin belt has had an insulating effect that reinforces the regional identity or 'personality' of Ulster. For some of its residents, however, most notably the poet Patrick Kavanagh (1904-1967), the small farm world of the drumlins was frustrating and claustrophobic. In this way the physical landscape may perhaps be considered to translate and close in on the psyche, whether collective or individual.
Glen O' the Downs
The Glen O' the Downs is the largest example in Ireland of a meltwater channel. It was formed by melting water draining from beneath the edge of the Irish Sea ice sheet about 15,000 years ago. Later the ice thawed to form large glacial lakes around Enniskerry and the glen formed an outlet channel to the south. Native woodland now covers the valley slopes.
Copyright R. Nairn.Glen O' the Downs
The Glen O' the Downs is the largest example in Ireland of a meltwater channel. It was formed by melting water draining from beneath the edge of the Irish Sea ice sheet about 15,000 years ago. Later the ice thawed to form large glacial lakes around Enniskerry and the glen formed an outlet channel to the south. Native woodland now covers the valley slopes.
Copyright R. Nairn.Several periods of glaciation have prevailed in Ireland during the last million years. The last of these finally waned some eleven or twelve thousand years ago. As the ice retreated and finally melted, huge quantities of water were released with sometimes far-reaching consequences. The impact of the few hundred years of drainage chaos that followed the melting of the ice is still evident in the landscape, in large 'meltwater channels' (for example the Scalp, and the Glen O' the Downs, both in Co. Wicklow) that now carry only small streams or none at all, in altered river courses, and in the lowland raised bogs, many of which began to form while drainage was impeded in the immediate post-glacial aftermath.
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