Talk:Glacier

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Good article Glacier was one of the good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
WikiProject Glaciers

This article is within the scope of the Glaciers WikiProject, a collaborative WikiProject related to glaciers and glaciology worldwide. It may include the Glacier infobox. If you would like to participate, you can choose to edit the article attached to this page (see Wikipedia:Contributing FAQ for more information).
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the assessment scale.
WikiProject Environment
Portal		 This environment-related article is part of the Environment WikiProject to improve Wikipedia's coverage of the environment.
The aim is to write neutral and well-referenced articles on environment-related topics, as well as to ensure that environment articles are properly categorized.
See WikiProject Environment and Wikipedia:Contributing FAQ.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the assessment scale.
This article has been reviewed by the Version 1.0 Editorial Team.
Version 0.5
 This article has been selected for Version 0.5 and subsequent release versions of Wikipedia.

Contents

[edit] Southern Patagonia Icefield

"Campo de hielo sur" or (CHS) Should be included in this article. Its the biggest glacier in the southern hemisphere nfter the antartic ones. A lot of glaciers (of lesser importance) are named here, but not this one.

[edit] Lambert ice shelf

203.177.168.235 dumped the following at the bottom of the page:

Lambert ice shelf is known as the largest glacier in the world. It has a height of 250 miles and is 402 kilometers long.

That may be so, but it'll need some editing before it goes in the main article (height 250 miles?). I haven't the time right now so I moved it here. JTN 19:15, 2004 Oct 25 (UTC)

The Lambert glacier feeds the L ice shelf. 250 miles is about 402 km? William M. Connolley 21:59, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC).

[edit] Consolidate?

Glacier Motion might needs to be integrated with glacier motion. The one I translated from es.wikipedia.com is more on why glaciers move, glacier motion describes historic movements and landscap transformation as result of the movement.

Maybe the articles should be consolidated. --JuanPDP 06:26, July 12, 2005 (UTC)

I think the glacial motion section should stay here; it fits within the scope of the article. However, the Quaternary and ice age sections should be merged into those respective articles. - mako 21:54, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Overlap between Es. and En. glacier articles

I just translated the "formation of glaciers" section and only after I was done did I bother to look at the English article already extant. It seems like we've got a significant amount of overlap between the English and Spanish articles, so what I'm going to do is excise the redundant Spanish paragraphs after I salvage any extra information. Might take a bit. Sadly, the paragraph I translated is going to have to go almost in its entirety. Fernando Rizo T/C 22:02, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] ¿radicación?

I left the following message on the es talk page:

"radicación solar": ¿se debe decir "radiación solar"? (Estamos traduciendo el artículo al inglés; favor de responder, o en inglés o en español, en la página en:talk:Glacier). Grácias.

Basically asking for clarification on what I think was a typo for the Spanish equivalent of "solar radiation". radicación is a word, but not one that makes sense to me in this context. Jmabel | Talk 05:07, July 25, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it was a typo and it should read "radiación solar" (solar radiation) as it does now. Thanks for pointing it out. --Balderai 05:13, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Whats going on then?

Does this spanish translation project really work by dumping a pile of spanish text into the en: pages and then slowly translating it out? That seems a rather poor way of working, because it trashes the article while you're working on it. Why isn't it done on a copy on the talk page or something? William M. Connolley 09:21:00, 2005-07-25 (UTC).

  • That is more or less exactly how it works. There's a note at the top of the page to warn the unsuspecting visitor that the page is going to be in flux for the week. Fernando Rizo T/C 15:42, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] English and español on the front page

Come on, people. It's not that terrible to see Spanish in an article temporarily, is it? At least r3m0t's preserved the Spanish text somewhere; however, even that solution is suboptimal, because there's no indication of where those pieces fit in to the original article. This morning, I started translating a section where the last translator stopped mid-paragraph. How would I know where the rest of that paragraph was supposed to go, or even that it was part of another paragraph, if it weren't already embedded in the article?

Spanish Translation of the Week has always worked by taking an entire article from sp.wikipedia.org, pasting it into the corresponding space here, and then translating it piece by piece. It takes about a week or so to complete the translation, and then we move on to the next article. (There's a history of past collaborations at Wikipedia:Spanish Translation of the Week/History.) It is, IMO, the simplest, quickest, least confusing way to do this work. Can we continue to work that way here? If not, why not? --Skoosh 17:30, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

I don't agree that this is the simplest or quickest or least confusing way to do the work. It does a terrible disservice to the readers, who are viewing this page by the thousands while you're making this kind of a mess. Just a few weeks ago Steve Jobs put the WP article tiger on a giant screen in front of hundreds of reporters - what kind of impression would it have made if the article were in Spanish or Russian or Malay at that point? It would have been just as easy to make a temp page, put a note at the top of the real article warning not to edit randomly because the temp page was going to become the real thing in a week or so. Doesn't anybody think about the readers anymore? Stan 18:36, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

Since this is a matter that potentially impacts this project in general, it's probably more appropriate to continue this on the W:SPATRA talk page, where there is already an ongoing discussion on the same issue. --Skoosh 19:16, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

Personally, it doesn't bother me as far as browsing goes to see the Spanish mixed in. However another issue is snapshots / dumps of WikiPedia used on disconnected devices, like Pocket PCs. Those types of conversions occur infrequently, so you would have these "translation in progress" articles mucking things up a bit. --Dan East 20:43, July 25, 2005 (UTC)

It was me that removed the spanish text from the article, and I realise now that I should have copied it somewhere. For not doing this I apologise, but you have understand that an article on the english wikipedia cannot be filled with spanish text! The main article space is entirely devoted to the readers, not the editors. You have to realise that like 99% of everyone that reads wikipedia is not an editor, they couldn't care less about WP:SPATRA. What kind of image does it present of wikipedia when they see a page like this? Many people even disagree that a COTW tag should be on the article! Why don't you work on it at Wikipedia:Spanish Translation of the Week/Glacier and translate there, and when you are done copy it into the article. That, or you could make a Talk: sub-page like Talk:Glacier/Spanish text and do it there. Again, I apologise for not doing this myself, I just figured one of you guys would be more comfortable doing it since it is your project. How about it? gkhan 21:40, July 25, 2005 (UTC) NB: I am not critical of the project itself, infact, I think it is marvelous idea. Keep up the good work.

I have proposed a solution here. Please leave your comments so that we may reach a consensus. — J3ff 01:27, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

gkhan, if you are "not critical of the project itself", couldn't you have commented out the material instead of deleting it? Because I promise, now that it is physically removed from the page, almost none of the participants in the translation project are going to find it anywhere else. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:18, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

I could have, had I thought of it :P Again I apologise for acting a little rash, but it's not like the text has disappeared or anything, it is in the history. And really, I think it is a great project, it was just the method I had concerns with. gkhan 07:35, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Translation of special terms

[edit] Roca aborregada

What is the proper term for this in English? Here's a translation of the relevant passage, found under "Glacial Erosion":

=== Rocas aborregadas === 
These are formed by the passage of a glacier as it carves small hills out of protrusions 
in the bedrock.  A protrusion of this type is known as a ''[[roca aborregada]]''.  ''Rocas 
aborregadas'' are formed when glacial abrasion polishes the smooth incline that faces the 
glacial ice next to it, and erosion increases the steepness of the opposite side 
proportionately as the ice passes over the protrusion.  These rocks indicate the direction 
of the glacier's flow.

"Roca" means "rock", and "aborregada", from what I gather, means "fleecy", or "like a sheep". Is this section talking about striation, or something else? --Skoosh 15:37, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

  • I've never heard that word in my life. I hope we can get an actual geologist to comment on what this might be. I'll leave a message on William M. Connolley's talk page. Fernando Rizo T/C 20:04, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

I'm not a geologist, but I have climbed in the French alps. It might well be what the French call a "roche moutonnee"... http://www.zephryus.demon.co.uk/geography/resources/glaciers/stria.html. I rather suspect that the English take over the french word. William M. Connolley 20:33:06, 2005-07-30 (UTC).

I don't know enough Spanish, but yes, rouche moutonnee is the English term for a glacial rock formation. --- hike395
USGS: "Roche Moutonnée: An elongated, rounded, asymmetrical, bedrock knob produced by glacier erosion. It has a gentle slope on its up-glacier side and a steep- to vertical-face on the down-glacier side." [1] There also is mention of "sheepback". [2] (SEWilco 02:52, 31 July 2005 (UTC))
Right! I had forgotten about "sheepback". Quick Google check of "Roche moutonnee +glacier" yields 395 hits, while "sheepback + glacier" yields 25. So, roche moutonnée is probably preferred. -- hike395 03:13, July 31, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] arranque

I've only encountered this word ("start" or "impulse") in the context of starting a car. So far, I've been eliding it, or replacing it with "motion" or "surge" or something else that flows naturally in context. I'm not sure if there's a specific term in English-language glaciology to replace it. Ideas? --Skoosh 15:37, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

The english equivalent is "plucking", the ripping of material from the downstream side of a rock. There are many usages similar to "Los glaciares erosionan el terreno principalmente de dos maneras: abrasión y arranque." (Glaciers erode the terrain primarily through two means: abrasion and plucking.) The es: article also shows a diagram showing "arranque" in the downstream side of a rock formation, at the same area where plucking occurs. (SEWilco 15:35, 31 July 2005 (UTC))

[edit] Glaciology

Glaciology is a very poor article; maybe it's better off merged with glacier? Or else somebody who knows about it should at least tidy it up. Rd232 17:42, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] SPATRA Progress report

Well, the rough translation is done. I've checked the article twice, and there's no commented text left (check it again, please, because I might have missed something). So, the only thing left to do is to go over the text with a fine comb. However, the following images need translation:

I've contacted Luis María Benítez, the original author of the images, and he is going to translate them tomorrow. I've been playing around with the SPATRA header to make it easier for him to find the images.

Good job, everyone! In spite of this week's controversy, we've finished another article. Pat yourselves on the back. :) --Titoxd 03:42, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

    • All right, that is done. --Titoxd 22:17, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I've finally taken a look at the article now that the translation is complete (way too much going on for me to try and following along while it was in process). In my opinion, the article still needs a great deal of work. First off, the article no longer defines a glacier! It talks about glaciers - how they're formed, and various terms associated with them, but it no longer defines what a glacier is. The first section should concisely describe the subject of the article. I'll take a look back at the article pre-conversion over the next few days to see what I can incorporate back in. I had added a paragraph to the article defining Tidewater Glaciers and the formation of icebergs. That has been completely removed. I'll be making a comment on the Wikipedia talk:Spanish Translation of the Week page. --Dan East 08:35, August 10, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Glaciology-related terms translated from Spanish into English / drawings and more

I know you have problems translating some Spanish geologic terms, so here I show you all the words that you might come across when writing about glaciers. I was the author of the Spanish version of this article and I had to face lots of English terms that I learned. I also translated the text on the drawings I created. Take a look:

GEOLOGIC TERMS:

  • Ablación: ablation.
  • Abrasión: abrasion.
  • Arista: Arête.
  • Arranque / arranque glacial: plucking / quarrying (it could be translated either way).
  • Balance (glaciar): glacial budget.
  • Bloque errático glaciar: glaciar erratic.
  • Circo (glaciar): Cirque.
  • Depósitos en contacto con el hielo: ice-contact deposit.
  • Derrubios estratificados: stratified drift.
  • Derrubio glaciar: drift.
  • Deslizamiento basal: basal slip.
  • Desmembramiento glaciar: calving.
  • Drumlin: drumlin.
  • Esker: esker.
  • Espolón truncado: truncated spur.
  • Estría glaciar: striation.
  • Flujo plástico: plastic flow.
  • Glaciar alpino: alpine glacier.
  • Glaciar de casquete: ice sheet.
  • Glaciar de desbordamiento: outlet glacier.
  • Glaciar de piedemonte: piedmont glacier.
  • Glaciar de valle: valley glacier.
  • Grieta (glaciar) / crevasse: crevasse.
  • Harina de roca: rock flour.
  • Horn: horn.
  • Kame: kame.
  • Kettle: kettle.
  • Lago Pater noster: Pater noster lake.
  • Lago pluvial: pluvial lake.
  • Límite de las nieves permanentes: snowline.
  • Llanura aluvial: outwash plain.
  • Llanura de inundación: Floodplain.
  • Morrena central: medial moraine.
  • Morrena de fondo: ground moraine.
  • Morrena lateral: lateral moraine.
  • Morrena terminal: terminal moraine / end moraine.
  • Morrena de retroceso: recessional moraine.
  • Neviza: firn.
  • Oleada (glaciar): surge.
  • Pequeño lago de montaña / tarn: tarn.
  • Plataforma glaciar: ice shelf.
  • Roca aborregada: roche mountonnée.
  • Terraza de kame: kame terrace.
  • Tilita: tillite.
  • Till: till.
  • Tren de valles: valley train.
  • Valle colgado: hanging valley.
  • Valle glaciar: glacial trough.
  • Zona de acumulación: zone of accumulation.
  • Zona de desgaste: zone of wastage.
  • Zona de fractura: zone of fracture.

Lahar: Lahar*. (*): this term is not necessarily related to glaciers, but as you know, when volcanic eruptions take place in an underground volcano, the ice right upon it melts and starts flowing in a spectacular view. This receives the name of lahars, and it is also known in Iceland (where you have lots of volcanoes underneath glaciers) as jökullhaup. In fact, this term is also applied by English-speakers when talking particularly about Icelandic lahars.

MY DRAWINGS:
plucking, drumlins, glacial ice formation, glacial weight effects, glacial landscape, Recedinc glacier landscape. I also uploaded no captioned versions so that these drawings could be used by other Wikipedia versions. See each description page. That’s all.

I have a subpage on the Spanish version with lots of drawings related to geology and other sciences. Take a look: Dibujos (Drawings). Please, feel free to contact me in case you need any help with this article. It is a pleasure indeed. Luis María Benítez 20:47, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Glacial retreat

I see that there is no mention of glacial retreat, which is the main glacial motion being observed in our time. Can this aspect have been an oversight? --Wetman 22:43, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] PAGE HI-JACKED

Does this belong on the page? "The largest glaciers are about the size of some overgrown gophers." Someone please revert.

  • I've taken care of it. Next time, why not revert it yourself? If you're new to wikipedia, here are instructions on how to revert. --Dan East 04:16, September 12, 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks. I didn't know how to do it.

[edit] upward deposition forces?

The following is most confusing:

The altitude where the two zones meet is called the equilibrium line. At this altitude, the downward erosive forces of the accumulation zone and the upward deposition forces of the deposition zone cancel out.

Can someone explain the upward deposition forces of the previous quote? It may be some glaciology jargon, but I envision sediments spurting up from the ice - propelled by some mysterious diapir like forces. What do we really mean? Vsmith 03:05, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

I think it means that at the head of the glacier, the downward pressure from the accumulating snow kinda scrapes the rock away, but it has to go somewhere, so it builds up at the foot of the glacier. Therefore the amount of rock underneath the glacier is decreasing at the head but increasing at the foot. The article is a little unclear though, because it's not really an upward force, just a tendency for sediment to build up. I'll try to improve it. —Keenan Pepper 04:47, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
I wonder if a translation from the Spanish page contributed to this phrasing. I'm interpreting the "upward" force as due to accumulation of deposits left behind by ablated/melted ice. So what is being referred to is the start of the zone where erosive ice encounters but is not able to push downhill the accumulated sediments? Incidentally, the present phrasing assumes ablation as the ice removal force and ignores that some glaciers experience melting during summer. (SEWilco 06:04, 28 October 2005 (UTC))

[edit] Ice penitents and ice flutes

Anybody able and willing to include an explanation of ice penitents and ice flutes formations, or initiate an article devoted to them? I don't feel able enough to do more than citing external sources, like this one.

[edit] Rayleigh Scattering

Simply put, after a good web search as well as a visit to the forest service visitor center down at the Mendenhall glacier I dont get how this was removed. It's the cause of the deep blue in a recently calved glacier. The breakout of air compressed down for decades or centuries trapped in glacier ice that cause it to turn the whiter, normal ice shade as it's exposed. The fact that glacier Ice does this when your ice cubes dont is because of formation. Glaciers are commonly formed by snow compressed by more snow rather then water freezing. -Mask 06:09, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "glacial motion"

after reading this i would recommend it to be re-written, slightly differently and including "types of glacial movement" including, laminar flow, internal deformation aswell as basal sliding, and the description of "plastic flow" which is internal deformation.

laminar flow is described but not named.

also, where is extending and compressing flow?...

a more clear distinction between how a polar and temperate glacier moves. and also about fluctuations around zero.

this all depends on whether this is a summary or suppose to be indepth

[edit] ice ages

added section on last intergalcial period and an external link KonaScout 14:52, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Definition

The current definition on this page of a glacier is not very good. It contains too many relative adjectives "large", "slow moving" and "slowly deforms". Large compared to what? Slowly moving compared to what? I also feel the phrase "river of ice" is an analogy and not good for a definition.

I propose the following definition: "A glacier is a moving perennial ice mass that flows through a mountain valley."

It is simple and removes unneeded items required to define a glacier. --Campbead 18:37, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Many glaciers do not (and never did) move through mountain valleys. Cheers Geologyguy 18:41, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Continents

Geologically and biogeographically, New Guinea and Australia are one continent - see Australia (continent). So there are still glaciers on all continents - though maybe not for much longer given the rate of melt on Puncak Jaya--Gergyl 13:03, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Glacial

I think we should make a glacial article that is separate from this one, i.e one that discusses what the opposite of a interglacial is. It need not be very long, as this article discusses most of the physical properties of a glacial (e.g. advance of the glaciers). I think it should made though, to explain there are periods of advance and retreat within an ice age. ~ UBeR (talk) 23:36, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Since glacial was linked to too much in referencing glacier actions (e.g. "glacial erosion"), I've made glacial period instead. Edit: It might also be prudent to note that while "Glacial" redirects here, "Glacial period" exists to define periods within an ice age. ~ UBeR (talk) 21:54, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Glacial" and "Glaciation"

The second sentence ont the page reads: "Glacial" and "Glaciation" redirect here. There is no further explanation of these terms on the glacier page. According to the relevant chapter of Wikipedia:Redirect there should be at least a short sentence like e.g. "glacial refers to anything related to glaciers" and "glaciation is the process of glacier development or the coalescence of single glaciers into an ice sheet". Is there any special reason here no to do so?--Jo (talk) 19:07, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Added info according to Wikipedia:Redirect, as no one gave any special reason. Jo (talk) 19:51, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Delisted GA

This article is clearly not of GA quality, as it has few references, and so I have delisted it. Please add inline citations. Johnfos (talk) 02:31, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Polar Ice Caps on Mars Section

Why is the bit about polar ice caps on mars in here? Seems a useless bit of trivia, and not really appropriate for the section. --Iscariot40 (talk) 06:57, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Expanded info and moved it to Glacier#Glaciers_on_Mars. Jo (talk) 19:49, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] ice fields? states?

Could we get a definition of theidifference between an ice field and a glacier? Also, how about a listing of what US states have glaciers and which don't? Also, I'm interseted if there are any Eastern mountain glaciers (Mount Washington, Laurentians, etc.)TCO (talk) 22:31, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I guess it is not quite explicit in this article and Ice field, but the fundamental difference is that glaciers move (first sentence of this article). Ice fields don't. The list of US states presently with glaciers will be pretty short. Without doing any checking, Alaska, and high mountain glaciers in Montana, Washington, Oregon, California, and Colorado. Maybe Wyoming. Cheers Geologyguy (talk) 22:36, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Glacier Melting

I strongly suggest to include a section on glaciar melting, which is a very hot international topic by scientist ranging from geologists and environmentalists to biologists. Cheers, BatteryIncluded (talk) 02:26, 24 March 2008 (UTC)