DOCUMENT RESUME ED 198 063 SO 013 145 AUTHOR. Price, Larry W. TITLE The Periglacial Environment, Permafrost, and Man. INSTITUTION Association of American Geographers, Washington, D.C. Commission on College Geography. SPONS AGENCY National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C. REPORT NO AAG-RP-14 PUB DATE 72 NOTE 93p.: Some photographs and charts may not reproduce clearly from EDRS in microfiche. AVAILABLE FROM Association of American Geographers, 1710 16th Street, N.w., Washington, DC 20009 ($4.00). EDPS PRICE MEDI Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS. DESCRIPTORS *Climate: Environmental Education; *Environmental Influences: *Geographic Concepts; *Geographic Regions: Geography Instruction: Higher Education: *Human Geography: *Physical Geography; Resource Materials ABSTRACT This booklet contains resource material on cold climate phenomena and their influences on humans. It is intended for use by teachers and students in college-level geography courses as a supplement to existing textbooks and as a means of filling thegap between significant resources in geography and readily accessible vterials. The material is presented in six chapters. Chapter I introduces the scope of the document_ and defines important terms. Chapter IT focuses on various climatic characteristics, including annual temperature ranges and classifications of periglacial climates. Chapter examines permafrost, with emphasis on its thermal characteristics, distribution, depth, origin, and associated features. Chapter IV investigates geomorphic processes (landscape evolution% in periglacial environments. Information is presentedon frost action, patterned ground and mass wasting. In Chapter V, biologic processes involving periglacial soil, vegetation, and wildlife are explored. In the final chapter, the limitationsand potentials of periglacial environments with regard to human living, engineering, and land use are explored. The ecology of polar regions is also examined. (DB) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ******4*************************************************************** U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS EOUCATION A WELFARE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF MATERIAL IN MICROFICHE ONLY EDUCATION HAS BEEN GRANTED BY, THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRO- DUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROM lyerfore, Wth THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGIN. I ATING IT POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRE- SENT OFFICIAL NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC).' THE PERIGLACIAL ENVIRONMENT, PERMAFROST, AND MAN Larry W. Price Portland State University Copyright 1972 by the ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN GEOGRAPHERS Commission on College Geography Washington, D.C. 20009 RESOURCE PAPER NO. 14 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 79-188229 Supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation FOREWORD The Resource Papers have been developed as expository documents for the use of both the student and instructor. They are experimental inthat they are designed to supplement existing texts and to fill a gap between significant research in geography and readily accessible materials. This Resource Paper is one of a series being developed by the Commission's Panel on Physical Geography, in cooperation with the Panel of Resource and Technical Papers. This series will be concerned with important concepts, viewpoints and relationships in physical geography. The Resource Papers are designed as supplements to a variety of undergraduate college geogriphy courses at the introductory and advanced levels. These Resource Papers are developed, printed, and distributed by the Commission on College Geography under the auspices of the Association of American Geographers with National Science Foundation support. The ideas presented in these papers do not necessarily imply endorsement by the AAG. Single copies are mailed free of charge to all AAG members. John F. Lounsbury Harold A. Winters Project Director Chairman, Panel on Commission on College Geography Physical Geography Panel Members James M. Goodman, University of Oklahoma Ian R. Manners, Columbia University Melvin G. Marcus, University of Michigan 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page I. Introduction II. Climate 3 Dry Climates with Severe Winters 3 Humid Climates with Severe Winters 3 Arctic type 3 Mountain type 3 Climates with Small Annual Temperature Range 3 Island climates in high latitudes 3 Mountain climates of low latitudes 6 III. Permafrost 7 General 7 Thermal Characteristics 7 Distribution 10 Depth 12 Origin 12 Associated Features 14 Ice wedges and ice-wedge polygons 14 Pingos 16 Thermokarst 18 IV. Geomorphic Processes 25 General 25 Frost Action 25 Frost wedging 26 Frost cracking 26 Frost heave and thrust 27 Needle ice 28 Patterned Ground 29 Classification 29 Circles 29 Polygons 29 Stripes 32 Origin 34 Mass Wasting 34 Frost crecp 34 Solifluction 37 Associated features 38 Talus 38 Page Blockfields 38 Rock glaciers 38 Solifluction lobes 41 Periglacial Landscape Evolution 43 V. Biologic Processes 45 General 45 Soils 45 Lithosols 47 Arctic brown soils 47 Tundra soils 47 Bog soils 48 Vegetation 48 Boreal forest 48 Treeline 50 Tundra 51 Wildlife 55 Periglacial Significance 58 Soil 58 Vegetation 59 Wildlife 59 VI. Implications to Man 61 General 61 Engineering 61 Transportation 63 Buildings 65 Utilities 66 Pipelines 68 Land Ure 71 Strategic 72 Extractive industries 72 Agriculture 73 Recreation 75 Ecology 75 Alaska Pipeline -75 Rampart Dam 78 Damming of Bering Strait 79 References Cited 83 LIST OF FIGURES Page 1. Glacial, nivational and periglacial erosional systems 2. Frost alternation days in different periglacial climates 4 3. Daily and seasonal temperature distribution in a continental and alpine tropical periglacial climate 5 4. Idealized geothermal gradient in permafrost 8 5. Typical air and ground temperatures at Barrow, Alaska 8 6. Schematic representation of effect of water bodies on permafrost 9 7. Permafrost temperatures with depth at three locations in arctic Alaska 10 8. Permafrost distribution in the Northern Hemisphere 11 9. Idealized cross section of the continuous and discontinuous permafrost zone 12 10. Carcass of extinct bison preserved in permafrost 14 11. Ice wedge 12. Schematic representation of ice-wedge evolution 15 13. Ice-wedge polygons 1" 14. Pingos 18 15. Schematic origin of Mackenzie type pingo 19 16. Thermokarst mounds 20 17. Thermocirque development along a river bank 21 18. Oriented lakes near Barrow, Alaska 22 19. Schematic representation of alas development 23 20. Frost wedging in a subarctic alpine environment 26 21. Needle ice 28 22. Schematic diagram of patterned ground 29 23. Nonsorted circle 30 24. Sorted circles 31 25. Nonsorted stripes 32 26. Sorted stripes 33 27. Diagram of frost creep, solifluction, and retrograde movement 36 28. Talus slope 39 29. Blockfield 40 30. Rock glacier 41 31. Solifluction lobes 42 32. Diagram of soil patterns in northern areas 46 33. Map of boreal forest and tundra vegetation 49 34. Boreal forest near Inuvik, N.W.T 50 35. Plant cover in low, middle, and high tundra 52 36. Vegetation and permafrost relationships across solifluction lobes 53 37. Heat regulation and temperature sensitivity of arctic and tropical animals 57 38. Graph of lemming population cycles at Point Barrow, Alaska 58 39. Collapse of roadway over ice wedge 62 40. Schoolhouse on permafrost at Glenallen, Alaska 62 41. Settling of lodge in permafrost along highway in Alaska 65 42. Utilidor system in Inuvik, N.W.T. 66 43. Theoretical growth of thawed cylinder around pipeline in permafrost 71 44. Heavy equipment tracks on Melville Island, N.W.T. 76 6 LIST OF TABLES Page 1. Selected Northern Hemisphere Permafrost Thicknesses 13 2. Genetic Classification of Patterned Ground 35 I am the land that listens, I am the land that broods; Steeped in eternal beauty, crystalline waters and woods. Long have I waited lonely, shunned as a thing accurst, Monstrous, moody, pathetic, the last of the lands and the first. Robert Service The Law of the Yukon THE PERIGLACIAL ENVIRONMENT, PERMAFROST, AND MAN I. INTRODUCTION The word "periglacial" (literally, around the glacier) was underlain by permafrost, e.g., high mountain areas of middle introduced by the Polish geographer, W. von Lozinski latitudes. For our purposes, periglacial environments are (1912, in Wright 1961, p.938) to emphasize the concept of simply those where frost processes dominate. This would formerly more severe climates adjacent to the Pleistocene include those parts of tropical and middle latitude moun- continental glaciers. The meaning of the term has been tains as well as subarctic areas subjected to intensive frost considerably expanded through time, however, so that in action, even in the absence of permafrost. current usage the word commonly connotes the spectrum Periglacial environments are contrasted with glacial and of cold climate phenomena, both past and present (Dylik nivation environments as illustrated in Figure1. In the 1964). Any high altitude or latitude area or feature may be glacial system the ice itself serves as the mode of transport considered periglacial regardless of its proximity to a glacier while in the periglacial system mass wasting is the principal in space or time. In general, the term embodies the concept method of transport. Nivation is the least important of the of a cold and rigorous environment, the processes operative three since