The Significance of High, Isolated, Low-relief Surfaces in Glaciated Mountain Ranges

Abstract:

The highest regions of glaciated mountain ranges are characterised by cirques, arêtes and steep hillslopes. In addition, though, many ranges exhibit high, isolated, low-relief surfaces, which may provide an important record of landscape evolution. Broad, low-curvature surfaces, for example in the Laramide Ranges of the western United States, reflect periglacial regolith production and transport (e.g., Anderson, 2002). Here, the focus is on smaller surfaces that appear to be out of equilibrium with current/recent surface processes, and are interpreted as former glacial valley floors isolated from the current valley network.

The low-relief surfaces at the crest of the Sierra Nevada, California, are diamict covered. The top of Sardine Canyon is a beheaded cirque, while the cirque on the western side of Baxter Pass is in the process of being beheaded. Meanwhile, the isolated patch of diamict on the northeastern ridge of University Peak is surrounded on all sides by steep cliffs, and presumably represents a more evolved surface. It is inferred that the glaciated eastern Sierra Nevada is subject to a cycle of drainage capture and relief inversion, driven by headward erosion by cirque glaciers.

The central Himalaya contains a number of low-relief, ice-covered surfaces far above the rest of the glacial valley network (e.g., the Sakyetang Glacier, >6,600m, above the Kazhen Glacier, <5,400m). The ice at > 6,000m is frozen to the bedrock, so sub-glacial erosion will be outpaced by rock uplift. The extreme relief and active tectonics of the central Himalaya mean that drainage capture is not necessarily required in the generation of high, isolated, low-relief surfaces; glacial steps can become exaggerated to form reconstituted glaciers.

High, isolated, low-relief surfaces are found across the Southern Alps, New Zealand, from Miserable Ridge and Kelly Saddle close to the western range front, through Urquhart Peak and Lake Browning near the Main Divide, to Kaimakamaka Peaks east of the Main Divide. As such, these surfaces may reflect uplift along the Alpine Fault, active tectonics at the Main Divide, or drainage reorganisation associated with either advection of topography across the Main Divide, or glacial processes.