Glaciers

            What is a Glacier? A glacier is a big moving mass of ice; it is formed in high mountains or high latitudes where the amount of snowfall is higher than the melting rate of snow. 2. How do glaciers differ from ice shelves, icebergs and sea ice? Glaciers are huge and they also have a granular structure. Glaciers change the shape and the land though they"re slow but significant movement. Ice shelves are floating masses of ice that are attached on at least one edge of the coast. Sea ice is seasonal ice during, during the summer there is less than in the winter. Icebergs are huge chucks of glaciers; they are also seasonal so they change with the climate. 3. How much glacier ice is on earth? There is over fifteen million square kilometers of glaciers covering the earth's surface. 4. How do glaciers form? Glaciers are formed when there is more snowfall than evaporation. If the snow from the winter does not melt during the summer the next winter will snow on top of the pervious winters snow, which keeps building up creating glaciers. 5. How do glaciers change the landscape? A glacier moves across the earth's surface it slowly caries and shapes new landscapes. The huge mass of the glacier allows it to pull up large boulders from the bedrock layers of solid rock beneath the lose rock fragment carry them along. All glaciers change and shape the land through there slow but significant movement. 6. Describe the ice sheets of Antarctica? The ice sheets in Antarctica lie below sea level in some locations, there is 1.24 miles of ice below sea level. There are bigger and thicker sizes, they also cover 10 million square miles in the west Antarctica. 7. What are ice ages? Compare the extent of glaciers during the last ice age with the extent today? The ice ages were around 100 million years ago, and it was the intervals of time when large areas of the earth were almost covered by ice. The ice ages took place during the Quaternary period.