Glaciers

Glaciers

1. The amount of ice on the Earth's surface keeps changing over time

   • Glacials and Interglacials
     • The last ice age in Earth's history was called the Pleistocene Period. It lasted 2 million years
     • Global Temperatures fluctuated greatly and glacial periods (cooler times) were interspersed with interglacials (warmer times)

2. Present Time

   • Now we are in a warmer period call the Holocene. Much of the ice has melted and covers only 10 percent of the Earth's surface. Most of it is in Antarctica
   • Facts
     • Antarctica has approximately 14 million square kilometres of ice.
     • Greenland has 1.7 million square kilometres of ice.
     • Ice caps and glaciers are found in mountanous areas like Alps, Rockies and HimalayaS

3. Evidence of change

   • Core samples taken from deep ice sheets - give record of changing temperatures from the different chemicals trapped in the layers of ice
   • Land forms show where there was glaciation
   • Fossils show where animals lived that could only tolerate warmer or colder temperature