What Is Periglacial Scotland?

Periglacial Scotland

The term periglacial was introduced in 1912 (Lozinski) and was used to describe climatic and geomorphic conditions that followed the Pleistocene glacier development. Scotland has witnessed a repeated growth of glaciers for past two and a half million years (McKirdy & Crofts, 2002). However, only a minor part of the country was buried under the ice (Imbrie, 1979). Especially North East Scotland was left bare and resembled frozen desert (McKirdy & Crofts, 2002) rather than snowy mountains of the West. Some argue it was a very restricted ice sheet development which failed to move past north east Scottish mainland onto the Orkney area (Bowen & Sykes, 1988). Others (Stoker & Holmes, 1991; Hall et al., 2003) believe the ice sheet

Traces of such activities can be found in North East Scotland to some extent in for example Ugie valley and Bennachie. The most extensive evidence of periglacial deposits is around Ellon and Windyhills.

Scottish environment from glacier times could be compared to modern day Siberia or Canada with its tundra-like properties. The ice and poor drainage created rubbly glacial material and gravel outwash around eastern coastline. The quartzite gravels were formed by stirring, churning and other cryoturbation processes during the freezing and thawing cycle of periglacial conditions (Mitchell, 2005). The formation of iron pan that prevented the soil from drainage, aided the soil transformation and peat development (Rowans et al., 1966). Apart from these deposits an evidence for periglacial trimline is rather extensive (Ballantyne & Stone, 2015). Trimline, even though is more common in the West, occurs in the North-east around Caithness and Buchan area where the trimmed ice sheets slightly eroded (Ballantyne & Hall, 2008). Ice wedges and ice wedge polygons formed in varied sizes across Scotland which left the areas with environments

They were often formed from poorly sorted materials created during deglaciation such as mud-slides and debris flows (Merritt & Leslie, 2010). The soils were unable to drain effectively which led to gelatinous sediments of a porridge-like texture to fill in holes. These materials then move and migrate and sometimes create loose sand and silt that is later carried away in dust storms (Stephenson et al., 1988). The ravels formed, show evidence of weathering and ice-caused disturbance. They are an important evidence regarding long-term evolution of the landscape in north-east Scotland during and before the ice ages. This was common at East Grampian ice-sheet where sandy morainic deposits were created by granite that has lost its original structure, for example near Inverurie (Merritt et al., 2003). East Grampian Drift also comprises with hummocky glacial deposits where the ice stagnated, active ice flow, however, lead to formation of constructional and push moraines. Irregular ridges were formed from glacial deposits near Hill of Fare and Cairn William as well and contained high amount of silty sandy gravel (Bremner,