Skip to content

Hartman Reserve Nature Center Glacial erratics EarthCache

Hidden : 8/8/2008
Difficulty:
1 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size:   not chosen (not chosen)

Join now to view geocache location details. It's free!

Watch

How Geocaching Works

Please note Use of geocaching.com services is subject to the terms and conditions in our disclaimer.

Geocache Description:

This earthcache this been placed by Glacier thousands of years ago, Along the Cedar River that runs along to the north of the site. .








As the Glacier had an impacted on the area. By adding their melt water as the Glaciers moved back to the north. The Cedar River has influenced the area itself. By changing, it’s course over thousand of the years of flow. Curing the Cedar Valley as it is Today. .

To the west and South is Hartman Reserve Nature Center is a 300 acre wooded isle located in the heart of metropolitan Black Hawk County. Hartman lies in the center of the Waterloo, Cedar Falls area. It offers many activities and experiences to all its visitors. Hartman Reserve Nature Center is an entity of the Black Hawk County Conservation Board. Since our creation in 1976 Hartman Reserve Nature Center has been designated as an Iowa Watch able Wildlife Site and an Important Bird Area. Deer, otter turkeys, pileated woodpeckers, red-shouldered hawks, foxes, vultures, and bald eagles are some of the wildlife you might see.

Glaciers have been likened to mighty rivers of ice. Although they move many times more slowly, glaciers have equivalent changes in flow rate and often form falls of fast-moving ice above slow-moving ice pools. Glaciers flow faster down their centers than at ice margins, and more quickly at the surface than at the bed.





we have been successful in observing glacial movement, but only partially successful in understanding the mechanisms that control it. Some glaciologists say that ice is a PERFECTLY PLASTIC substance. (That is, brittle and capable of cracking like a solid, yet deformable and capable of flowing at other stresses.) (Patterson, 1981). Glaciologists have defined two distinct types of glacial movement -- deformation of the ice, and sliding of the glacier upon its rock bed. You can see where deformation has taken place by observing the wavelike flow patterns within the ice. Near the equilibrium, line on Visually Glacier perhaps 5 to 20 percent of the glacier's movement is caused by ice deformation; 80 to 95 percent of its movement is caused by sliding of the entire glacier upon its bed (Hodge, 1974). Note the effects of glacial sliding where the ice has towed rocks that scratched the bedrock. .

How fast a glacier moves is mostly dependent on the thickness of the ice, and on the angle of its surface slope (Patterson, 1981). Glacier speeds vary when changes are made in this geometry. They respond to excessively high seasonal snow accumulations by generating bulges of thicker ice that may move down valley many times faster than the glacier's normal velocity (Patterson, 1981). We can measure those KINEMATIC WAVES using instruments to survey the glacier surface. These waves leave a legacy of severely cracked ice and often advance the glacier terminus. Kinematics waves may occur on all large glaciers. At Mount Rainier, their behavior has been studied on Nisqually Glacier. One of the most complete records of kinematics wave movement is shown in. When measured during May 1969, at its equilibrium line, Nisqually Glacier moved about 18 inches per day; during the preceding November it moved only 8 inches per day (Hodge, 1974). Glaciologists disagree about exactly how water flows inside and beneath glaciers. However, they agree that these changes in speed are likely indicators of maximum and minimum water storage in cavities within the ice. .






in an e-mail to me: .

1. Tell me the height of these boulders at it’s tallest point. .

2.Describe to me the surface texture of the boulders. (Is it rough, smooth, etc.) .

3.Based on what you might know already, or what I've described in this Earth cache’s write up, how can one be certain that this boulder is not from this area? .

and .

4.When you log this cache, please upload a picture of yourself/team with your GPS clearly visible in front of the boulder. .

Special Thanks to ED Gruenwald the director of Hartman Reserve Nature Center for allowing me to place this earthcache. .

Additional Hints (No hints available.)