Wisconsin Glaciation Terms
Basin: geographically a low area of land
Bedrock: rock base underlying the soil layers
Bog: an decompression area of poorly drainage that receives its precipitation solely by atmospheric rainwater and snow. *In Wisconsin usually found in the Kettle Moraine areas of the state from the recent glaciation period.
Collapsed till: when ice chunks were covered with till their eventual
melting created rolling landscape areas
Debris: soil and rock carried by glaciers
Driftless Area: The unglaciated southwest REGION of Wisconsin
Drumlins: Oval or elongated hills formed between 5 and 20 miles from
the edges of glacial lobes, aligned in the direction of ice movement.
end moraine: the furthest advance of the glacier recognized by a line of boulders & gravel deposited by the receding glaciers.
Erratics: boulders that were transported from their point of origin
eskers: An above ground, sinuous riverlike formation of debris formed
from a glacial stream flowing over frozen ground under a glacier.
Fissures: deep cracks which develop in glacial ice created from pressure melting & movement of ice.
drift: deposited surface debris (clay, silt, sand, pebbles, cobbles, boulders)
Glacial “Lake Wisconsin”: Huge glacial lake formed near Prairie du Sac
-formed “sand counties
Green Bay Lobe – the tongue of the glacier that carved out Green Bay,
Lake Winnebago and the Horicon Marsh.
Ice Age: Geologic age when ice sheets covered 30% of land.
Ice cap: Continental Glaciers: 2 miles deep in central Canada; 400 feet deep over Wisconsin
Ice sheet: another name for the continental glaciers.
Interglacial: geologic time between glacial ice sheets
kames: conical hills, formed when meltwater moves through fissures in
the ice and create a cone shape deposit of debris.
kettles: potlike landforms made when huge chunks of ice broke off and was buried in till by the receding glaciers, when melted it formed a feature known as a “kettle.”
Kettle Moraine Area: Rocky debris region when Green Bay Lobe
collided with the Lake Michigan Lobe.
Lake Algonquin: Glacial Lake encompased Lakes Huron, Michigan,
Superior, Winnipeg, Lake of the Woods, and part of Manitoba.
Lake Michigan Lobe: tongue created Lakes Superior & Michigan
Lobe: the portion of glacial ice also known as a “tongue”
Moraines: ridges made up of till. Usually much longer than wide.
Outwash: debris carried by meltwater.
recessional moraine: a line of boulders and gravel deposited when the
glaciers were not moving or receding.
Rebound: the phenomenon whereby the glacially depressed land is
uplifting to its preglacial level.
Till: rock debris deposited directly by moving or melting ice, with no
meltwater flow, or redeposition, involved. UNSORTED/UNSTRATIFIED, angular MATERIAL (Erratics)
Topography: the lay of the land and land formations. (landscapes!)
Two Creeks Buried Forest: Forest buried by advance of last ice age.
Tundra: earth that is always frozen in permafrost
Wisconsin Glacier: The last glacial advance in northern
