Glaciers are masterpieces of nature in cold regions, and such places also have summer. Whenever the temperature warms up in summer and the glaciers melt, much strange scenery will be produced.
This article will take you to see those strange glacier melting scenes.
1. Ice cave
Meltwater on glaciers often forms a branch-like network of small rivers during the flow process, which sometimes meanders and sometimes dives into the ice.
On some glaciers with a lot of melting water and a large area, interglacial rivers are particularly well developed. When interglacial rivers flow from the end of the ice tongue, they often scour into deep ice caves.
The entrance of the cave is like an arch of an ancient city. The water flowing out of the ice cave is cloudy and white like milk because of the suspended debris, which is called glacier milk in glaciology. When the glacier is dry, walking into the ice cave is like entering a crystal palace.
In some glaciers, it is possible to go all the way to the bottom of the glacier through tunnels in the ice caves. There are single-ice caves, dendritic ones, and holes in the caves.
In the cave, there are many icicles and ice stalactites, and the patterns on the cave walls are very beautiful. The exits of some ice caves hang high on the ice cliffs, forming very spectacular ice-water waterfalls.
2. The "funnel" of the glacier
In the upper part of the valley near the top of the hill and the watershed, a catch funnel is always formed.
When the climate turns cold and glaciers begin to develop, the water-collecting funnel near the top of the mountain will be occupied by ice and snow first, and the ice and snow will accumulate to a certain extent in the water-collecting funnel and flow to form a glacier.
The glacier has a huge planing effect on the valley floor and its edges, and it is constantly working like a carpenter's plane and file. The original water-collecting funnel was gradually eroded into a basin shape surrounded by mountains on three sides, like a wicker chair. This terrain is the ice cirque. Most of the ice cirques are developed at the elevation near the snow line.
Ordinary valley glaciers often climb up the ice ridge to see the snow basins of white snow. When the glacier disappears, the bottom of such a basin is a cirque lake.
Tiran lakes can often be seen on high mountains, and they are regularly distributed at a certain height, representing the height of the snow line in the ancient ice age.
3. Lakes on glaciers
There are three main forms of ice lake formation. One is that the subglacial channel on the glacier melts the glacier, creating huge caves or tunnels, and the top of the cave collapses to form a deep and large long strip lake.
One is the accumulation of water in the low depression of the glacier, which is formed by strong erosion in summer. In addition, the jagged horn peaks around the glacier often continue to the avalanche debris.
If a larger volume of rock covers the glacier, it will cause differential ablation. The ice exposed to the sun around the big rock has all melted, but the ice in the shade under the rock has not yet melted, and as a result, it "grows" into ice mushrooms of various sizes.
Frozen lakes add even more color to the glacier landscape. In summer, whenever the sun rises or the sun sets, the lake is full of rays of light, brilliant and dazzling.
4. Ice Tower
The tower-shaped icicles standing on the surface of the glacier are ice towers. On many large glaciers in the areas of Mount Everest, there are rare forests of seracs in the world.
One after another, the ice towers tens of meters high, as if sculpted out of white marble, stand facing the sky on the glacier, in various poses.
