Unit 9

THE ACTION OF EXTERNAL

AGENTS ON RELIEF
IES Val Mior
Seccin Europea
Biology & Geology 3 ESO

1. THE GEOLOGICAL ACTION OF WATER

Water acts in various ways:
- as surface runoff (escorrenta superficial)
- washes (torrentes)
- rivers
- seas (waves, tides and ocean currents)
- underground streams (correntes subterrneas)

1.1 SURFACE RUNOFF

- Water flows freely without following an established course
- Its action is more intense:
- on steep slopes (pendentes pronunciadas)
- when rain is torrential
- when the substrate is formed by soft rock or deep soil
- where there are no plants to protect the soil
- The effects of surface runoff are more noticeable in regions with
subdesert climates. There are not very many plants there and
rain is torrential
- The ground is covered with furrow (surcos), which increase in
size until they become gullies (crcavas). This kind of
landscape is called badlands (paisaxes ridos con crcavas)

1.2 WASHES (torrente)

- Sporadic water channels with a established course which
appear where a steep slope suddenly ends in a flat area
- Washes have 3 sections:
- receiving basin (conca de recepcin)
- natural channel (canal de desaugadoiro)
- alluvial fan (abano aluvial)

1.2 WASHES (torrente)

receiving basin (conca de recepcin)

natural channel
(canal de desaugadoiro)

alluvial fan (abano aluvial)

1.3 RIVERS
- They have a high capacity for erosion and transport
- They sort the materials they carry by particle size
- The longitudinal profile of a river:
1. Upstream section
2. Middle section
3. Downstream section

1.3 RIVERS
Rivers sort the materials they carry by particle size

An oxbow lake is a U-shaped body

of water formed when a wide
meander from the main stream of a
river is cut off to create a lake

(lago de media la)

1.3 RIVERS
1. Upstream section
- the slope is steep
- the water flows quickly and is very erosive
- the water creates V-shaped valley and gorges (ravines or canyon)

1.3 RIVERS
1. Upstream section: gorges (ravines or canyon)

Desfiladero de Mont-rebei,
Pirineo cataln
Desfiladero de los Gaitanes, Mlaga

1.3 RIVERS
2-3. Middle to downstream section
- the slope become less pronounced
- the water flows less quickly
- the water begins to deposit some of the load it is carrying
(from the largest to the finest particles)
- the valley becomes wider and flatter at the bottom (troughshaped valley)
- because of the lower speed of the current, the river channel
forms meanders

1.3 RIVERS
2-3. Middle to downstream section

Trough-shaped valley: valle del Ceze,Francia

Notice the deposits on the

inside banks of meanders.

1.3 RIVERS
(chaira de inundacin)

Flood plain: plain that borders a

river, formed from sediment
deposited by flood; it is an area
of great fertility

River mouth (where the river flows into the sea)

A) DELTAS
- They are formed by deposits of sediments as the river enter
the sea
B) ESTUARIES
- The sea enters the downstream section of the river, because
the river does not carry much sediments or flows into the
sea with strong current capable of redistributing the
sediments

1.4 THE SEA

The action of the sea on relief produces coastal landforms
(cabo)
(acantilado)

(cala)

(marisma de
auga salobre)

(punta)

1.4 THE SEA

COASTAL EROSION
- When rocks are heterogeneous, they have different resistance
to erosion and the coastal landscape has headlands, bays and
coves
- When there are homogeneous rocks, the coastline is straight
The most typical landform of coastal erosion are cliffs

- The erosion of a cliff is greatest at its base where large waves break and
they undercut the foot of the cliff, forming a wave-cut notch
- This undercutting continues and the overhanging cliff collapses downwards
- This erosive process continues and the cliff gradually retreats and becomes
steeper.
- As the cliff retreats, a rocky platform is left at the base, this is known as a
wave-cut platform which is exposed at low tide

1.4 THE SEA

COASTAL DEPOSITION

- When the waves deposit the sediments they are carrying,

beaches and sandbars are formed. As these sandy deposits
grow, they can close a bay off from the open sea (lagoon,
laguna), or they can join an island to the coast (tombolo)

- The sediments deposit

around a river mouths
can form a coastal
marshes (marisma) (flat
areas with channels
where sea water enters
the land and leaves it)

1.5 UNDERGROUND WATER (KARST LANDFORMS)

Karst landforms are produced as a result of the dissolution
process when water is trapped in soluble rocks, like salts,
gypsum (xeso) and limestone (caliza)
Karst landforms can be:
- surface landform
- underground landform

Surface karst landform

Limestone pavement (lapiaz) are created by
water flowing over the surface of the rock and
dissolving it
Sinkholes (dolina) are more or less circular
depressions; swallow holes (sumidero) where a
stream disappears underground
Poljes are very large depressions

Underground karst landform

Potholes (sima) are vertical underground caves
Caves are horizontal and contain passages, caverns and
chambers

1.5 UNDERGROUND WATER (KARST LANDFORMS)

There are different kinds of underground formations produced
by precipitation of calcium carbonate contained in dripping
water:
Stalactites: developed on
cave ceiling
Stalagmites: developed
on cave floors
Columns: formed when
stalactites and stalagmites
join together

2. THE GEOLOGICAL ACTION OF ICE

- Glaciers are enormous bodies of ice formed by
compacted snow. Gravity causes them to flow to areas
where they melt
- Ice sheets or continental glaciers are huge areas of
glaciers in Antartic and Greenland which can be
several kilometers thick
- Alpine or valley glaciers are found in mountain areas
of temperate climate

THE CHARACTRERISTICS OF GLACIERS

- Huge capacity to erode and transport material
They are capable of excavating deep valleys and of
transporting blocks of rocks of hundreds of meters
- Glaciers do not smooth the sediments they carry or
separated them by size. The sediments are deposited in
linear mounds called moraines
Depending on their position,
moraines can be classified as
lateral, medial, ground or
terminal moraines

Existen varios tipos de morrena segundo a sa relacin c glaciar:

Morrena de fondo: sitase baixo o xeo, en contacto c leito
Morrena lateral: os derrubios sitanse nas beiras do leito glaciar
Morrena central: formadas pola unin de morrenas laterais na
confluencia de dous glaciares nun mismo val
Morrena frontal ou terminal: depsitos de derrubios na zona de
desxeo do glaciar

EROSION LANDFORMS
These include cirques, U-shapped valley, horn (picos piramidais
agudos) and tarn (lago pequeno de montaa).
Circo glaciar: conca en forma
de anfiteatro situada na
cabeceira dun val glaciar