This photo was taken this morning by somebody at Newgale on St Bride's Bay, Pembs. It shows the fresh exposure of the submerged forest following the huge storms of recent weeks. You can see the exposures of the peat bed very clearly.
The "fluting" is interesting. I suspect that this is an erosional phenomenon, caused by water streaming back down the beach in gullies or rills after storm waves have broken higher up the beach. That's just speculation -- one needs to examine the place properly -- easier said than done at the moment, since the road at Newgale is still closed to all traffic.
9 comments:
Just had an interesting thought. I wonder if these rills are aligned to the midwinter solstice sunset?!!
The same phenomenon could be seen at Abremawr beach at low tide on Saturday afternoon.
The stone bank ( i read was thrown up by another great storm in 1856) has been pushed back about 20 feet into the bogland at the back.
That cave that you blogged a few years ago is still there, although the cliff line looks a little different now.
The grass bank at the back of the northern part of the beach has also been washed away to about a 6 foot depth.
All very fascinating and evidence of the strengh and the power of the weather last weekend.
Thanks Davey -- must try to get over and have a look at it. Over the years I have seen some splendid examples of the submerged forest in Aber Mawr, including a great deal of wood.
The storm beach was not created in 1856 -- it has been there for maybe 5,000 years, and was formed around the time that the Holocene sea level rise stopped. It does occasionally get driven a bit further inland during exceptional storms -- as we are seeing at the moment. And when that happens, more of the old sediments are revealed -- they run right under the storm beach.
Thought that that infamous storm in the 1850's as being the culprit was a little odd. That will teach me to rely on Abermawr's entry in Wikipedia.
Ah -- you should only believe what you read in Wikipedia if you really WANT to.........
Brian,
Are these 'pillar stones' lying along the exposed beach? Could these be Preseli pillars? Take some good pictures and some samples of these for Myris!
Remember that the strips of the submerged forest you can see in the photo are SOFT. They are very easily eroded..... so I was surprised by a post on another blog the other day about the "petrified forest" being exposed. It's not petrified at all -- you can pick out the bits of peat and even hazel nuts and other plant debris, as well as branches, roots and trunks of trees.
Any idea what the date of submersion might be?
It's still visible now, but not much. It's definitely getting covered up quite quickly, probably only a couple more days and it'll be gone.
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