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Monday 9 November 2015

The Tafarn y Bwlch Moraine (2)


This is a fabulous photo from the Royal Commission (Coflein) web site showing the area across which I wandered a week ago, during the November heat wave.  Probably taken by Toby Driver, to whom many thanks.   I have put a few labels on it, but there are many more features of interest.  The moraine shows up as a distinct ridge, and the supposed marginal channels are clearly seen below the route of the old pack road.  There are some serious gullies in the postulated ice-covered zone, and next time I get a nice day I might well go and check them out......

The cattle grid is just off the photo at bottom left.   Bwlch Gwynt summit is off the photo at top right.

I'm still puzzled by that extensive till plain beyond the end moraine.  If the till across that area is genuinely Late Devensian, then the end moraine might simply be a retreat moraine, marking a stillstand of the ice edge during a long eriod of gradual retreat.

And the next question is this:  was there a Preseli ice cap occupying much of the summit area which I have marked as the "pro-glacial area"?   Watch this space......







1 comment:

TonyH said...

You did a Post quite a while back, which, despite several searches I've been unable to locate. It is about the features on the Salisbury Plain's northern slope, near Westbury, in which you ponder the possibility of glaciation - created features there. You included a coloured photograph. The photo was fairly near the Westbury White Horse/ Bratton Iron Age Camp. Your current Post brought it to mind.