450

Site number:

450

Authors:

IBC, GGC

Date recorded:

1978/11/22

Reason Sampled:

Soil weathering examination

Description:

On the southeast side of the upper reaches of the Hatherton Glacier and to the SE of Turnstile Ridge; approximately 5.5km east of Pk 2421; on the floor of an old valley formed by former ice advances of the Polar Plateau; a salty hollow on the valley floor; possibly a former wet site

Altitude:

1550 m

Aspect:

Nil

Slope:

0 °

Climate

Soil climate zone:

Inland Mountain

Estimated mean annual temperature:

-30 °C

Frozen ground depth:

20 > cm

Frozen type:

Frozen comment:

>20cm

Geology

Geological setting:

Ferrar Dolerite caps the ridges and forms a prominent escarpment marking the edge of the Polar Plateau; a former more extensive Polar Ice Sheet would have extended in icefalls over the escarpment; the valleys on the SW side of the Hatherton Glacier appear to form an old landscape; moraine sequences reflect the advances from the Hatherton Glacier; some depressions in the landscape may have been former salty wet hollows

Patterned ground:

Nil

Surface weathering or surface features:

A well developed surface pavement of small cobbles, pebbles and granular sand; coarser clasts are unstained; a soft soil surface, typical of that often associated with salty hollow soils; salts precipitated at the soil surface; many clasts have very dark coloured staining; well developed ventiforms; some sandstone clasts are whitish and disaggregating

Soil

Soil parent material:

Drift from dolerite and sandstone; posibly some sediment

Previous disturbance:

Nil

Soil weathering stage:

6 3 (Campbell & Claridge 1975)

Soil moisture status:

No snow cover or soil moistening

Biological activity:

Nil observed