ABSTRACT This paper presents a detailed sedimentologic data set of minor moraines (heights ≤2.0 m, widths ≤14 m, lengths ≤108 m) that formed beginning near the end of the Little Ice Age by Schwarzensteinkees, a valley glacier in Austria. Sorted sediment and stratified diamict dominate five exposures, and compact massive diamict exists in one exposure. This sediment is interpreted as proglacial outwash and subglacial till. Most moraine sediment shows deformation structures (e.g., smaller and larger folds), and some units contain evidence of water escape. Other units maintain their original subhorizontality. All moraines contain unequivocal evidence of having formed through deformation by pushing during ice-margin fluctuations. Minor moraines formed more specifically by three identified processes: (1) pushing of outwash sediment; (2) stacking and pushing of outwash sediment; and (3) pushing of outwash sediment and freezing-on of subglacial till. Our data suggest that the sedimentologic composition of the valley fill influences the style of push-moraine formation. In this case, the friable nature of outwash sediments can increase the efficiency of the pushing ice front and the likelihood of sediment collapse down the proximal ice-contact slope after ice retreat. This study contributes to our understanding of sediment transport and deposition in high-mountain environments.

ABSTRACT The Tuya-Kawdy region of northern British Columbia is well established as a place where glaciation and volcanism overlapped in space. However, no modern work has integrated observations from the region’s volcanic and glacial deposits with geochronologic constraints to summarize how they might overlap in time. Here, we provide a general overview of such characteristics and 23 new 40 Ar/ 39 Ar eruption ages of glaciovolcanic deposits ranging from 4.3 Ma to 63 ka to constrain the timing, location, and minimum thicknesses and distributions of coincident ice. Subaerial lava fields interspersed with glaciovolcanism record periods of ice-sheet absence in presumably warmer climate conditions. These generally coincide with interglacial marine isotope stages. Many of the volcanoes have a secondary record of posteruption glacial modification, cirques, erratics, and mega-lineations, which document later climate changes up to the present. We used edifice-based terrain analysis to reconstruct changes to local minimum Cordilleran ice-sheet thicknesses, extents, and flow directions at specific locations and times during the late Pliocene and the Pleistocene.

ABSTRACT The Eagle Lake basin was formed by collapse of the ablating Lake Michigan lobe over a tunnel valley and subsequent reoccupation of the collapse basin by the lobe during local final phase of glaciation. Latest collapse occurred prior to about 16,250 but after 18,600 cal yr B.P. A hydrologically open lake occupied Eagle Lake basin from 16,250 cal yr B.P. to the present. The lake was described in 1834 by the original land survey, but was drained for agriculture by 1939.

ABSTRACT The northern Puget Lowland of Washington State, USA, provides an exceptional opportunity not only to examine grounding line processes associated with marine-based ice sheets, but also to relate subaerial outcrop to marine geological observations of grounding line landforms and sedimentary processes in Antarctica and the deglaciated Northern Hemisphere. During this trip, we visit outcrops that record the interaction of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet and its bed, starting with locations where the ice sheet slowly flowed across crystalline bedrock. We also visit locations where the ice flowed across unconsolidated deposits, allowing discussions of subglacial bed deformation and grounding zone wedge development. Evidence shows that grounding line retreat across Whidbey Island was punctuated by periods of grounding line position stability and local ice advance during the growth of multiple grounding zone wedges. We will discuss the criteria for identifying grounding zone wedges, including diamicton units with foreset bedding that downlap onto a regional glacial unconformity at the base, and are truncated at the top by localized unconformities indicative of ice advance across the foreset beds. Grounding zone wedge foreset beds are composed of debris flows sourced from a deformation till and from sediment transported to the grounding line by subglacial meltwater. The overlying surface unconformity is associated with a laterally discontinuous till and pervasive glacial lineations. Other field stops focus on iceberg scouring and evidence of subglacial meltwater drainage, as well as the transition from marine to subaerial conditions during retreat of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet from the northern Puget Lowland.

The Eyreville A and B cores, recovered from the “moat” of the Chesapeake Bay impact structure, provide a thick section of sediment-clast breccias and minor stratified sediments from 1095.74 to 443.90 m. This paper discusses the components of these breccias, presents a geologic column and descriptive lithologic framework for them, and formalizes the Exmore Formation. From 1095.74 to ~867 m, the cores consist of nonmarine sediment boulders and sand (rare blocks up to 15.3 m intersected diameter). A sharp contact in both cores at ~867 m marks the lowest clayey, silty, glauconitic quartz sand that constitutes the base of the Exmore Formation and its lower diamicton member. Here, material derived from the upper sediment target layers, as well as some impact ejecta, occurs. The block-dominated member of the Exmore Formation, from ~855–618.23 m, consists of nonmarine sediment blocks and boulders (up to 45.5 m) that are juxtaposed complexly. Blocks of oxidized clay are an important component. Above 618.23 m, which is the base of the informal upper diamicton member of the Exmore Formation, the glauconitic matrix is a consistent component in diamicton layers between nonmarine sediment clasts that decrease in size upward in the section. Crystalline-rock clasts are not randomly distributed but rather form local concentrations. The upper part of the Exmore Formation consists of crudely fining-upward sandy packages capped by laminated silt and clay. The overlap interval of Eyreville A and B (940–~760 m) allows recognition of local similarities and differences in the breccias.