Studies in the physical geography of north-central Baffin Island, N.W.T

Abstract
Data accruing from reconnaissance field work in north-central Baffin Island and from intensive air photograph interpretation have been utilized to prepare colored maps of glacial features on scales of 1 :500,000 and 1 :250,000. These sheets are the first in a series of terrain analysis maps of Baffin Island; sheets for other terrain features will be compiled and published separately. The text provides a detailed description of the maps and an analysis of the probable course of deglacierization of the Baffin Island-Foxe Basin area and lays the foundation for a long-term program of field investigation. Much of the discussion is tentative, being based upon relatively limited data from a large tract of land. Nevertheless, it is apparent that mountain glaciers played an insignificant part in the over-all glacierization of Baffin Island; that at a relatively late phase in the last glaciation a large, inland ice mass occupied most of the land west of the eastern coastal mountains, probably extending far into Foxe Basin; and that the final phases saw the westward withdrawal of this ice sheet from the regional watershed and the persistence of ice lobes in the main Foxe Basin valleys, thus resisting encroachment of the late-glacial sea. Glacial and glacio-fluvial features formed during this process are well preserved and can be related to forms under construction around the present margins of the Barnes lce Cap. The concept of deglacierization under arctic climate conditions is introduced as a logical approach to an understanding of features formed adjacent to and beneath a cold ice sheet. One of the most outstanding discoveries is the Cockburn end-moraine system, which extends for more than 400 miles, roughly parallel to the heads of the Baffin Bay fiords; this system has been related to a late-phase stand of the inland ice.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: