Discoveries
Written November 15, 2009
I love taking walks. Every time I do, I make surprising new discoveries.
My first walk was to the Taylor Glacier and up across the moraines (debris left by glaciers) south of Lake Joyce. The landscape has all sorts of strange mounds and hollows that I now know probably form when buried ground ice thaws and the water runs out. The surface collapses making a hollow and leaving mounds behind. This walk was a wander.
My second walk was more directed. Dale had spotted a possible ice patch on a Google Earth image before we left the US. He was hoping to be able to find it on the ground once we got here. He showed me where it was, and I walked in that direction. After seeing tons of cool things, including polygonal fractures caused by expansion and contraction of the ground,
I walked over a big mound of till (also debris left by glaciers) and found this beautiful blue ice patch.
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The ice is clear and has bubbles caught in it, which indicates that it was a pond when it froze rather than being remnant glacial ice.
There is probably remnant glacial ice in this area and that supplied the water for the little pond, but I didn’t see it at the surface. However, on a later walk, I did find exposed ground ice on a west-facing channel wall.
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I wasn’t looking for ground ice on this walk, but I was looking for a source of water for some other ponds. The ponds looked to me like they had overflowed into Lake Joyce last year, and I was curious where the water came from. I chose the fan with channels that looked the freshest and followed them up into the moraines. The big channel that fed the fan had ice at it’s bottom, but it was often covered with wind blow sand and granules. I though maybe it flowed last year. But when I saw the ground ice, I knew that it must have. There was liquid water even on that day in November when it was still spring and fairly cold. The sun was just hot enough to melt the ice! I’m sure by January, water is flowing down that channel, into the ponds, and into our lake! It was a very exciting find.
My walks are also interesting historically. I had a conversation with some friends at Picnic Day last spring about feeling like you’re the first person to ever be in an area. I said that I sometimes felt that way, but every time I started to, I found evidence of previous travelers. This is also true in Lake Joyce, the most remote place I’ve ever been. I can walk for an hour and not see a sign of others, but then the history pops up.
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This area was actually the focus of a study by the New Zealand Antarctic Program. How do we know they were from New Zealand?
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There are also more subtle signs of previous scientists, like this rebar survey stake.
.jpg)
There is also a mystery weather station that no one seems to know who left. We’d like the data!
The history of Pearse Valley discoveries extends back decades, and we’re adding ours to that history. We aren’t the first people here, but we are the first to make some of the scientific observations we’re working on. I don’t mind not being first. I am happy to be here, learning what I can from an interesting lake in a beautiful environment.
I love taking walks. Every time I do, I make surprising new discoveries.
My first walk was to the Taylor Glacier and up across the moraines (debris left by glaciers) south of Lake Joyce. The landscape has all sorts of strange mounds and hollows that I now know probably form when buried ground ice thaws and the water runs out. The surface collapses making a hollow and leaving mounds behind. This walk was a wander.
My second walk was more directed. Dale had spotted a possible ice patch on a Google Earth image before we left the US. He was hoping to be able to find it on the ground once we got here. He showed me where it was, and I walked in that direction. After seeing tons of cool things, including polygonal fractures caused by expansion and contraction of the ground,
I walked over a big mound of till (also debris left by glaciers) and found this beautiful blue ice patch.
.jpg)
The ice is clear and has bubbles caught in it, which indicates that it was a pond when it froze rather than being remnant glacial ice.
There is probably remnant glacial ice in this area and that supplied the water for the little pond, but I didn’t see it at the surface. However, on a later walk, I did find exposed ground ice on a west-facing channel wall.
.jpg)
The white patches are snow and the ground ice. The tan patch in the foreground behind the large rock is slushy water.
I wasn’t looking for ground ice on this walk, but I was looking for a source of water for some other ponds. The ponds looked to me like they had overflowed into Lake Joyce last year, and I was curious where the water came from. I chose the fan with channels that looked the freshest and followed them up into the moraines. The big channel that fed the fan had ice at it’s bottom, but it was often covered with wind blow sand and granules. I though maybe it flowed last year. But when I saw the ground ice, I knew that it must have. There was liquid water even on that day in November when it was still spring and fairly cold. The sun was just hot enough to melt the ice! I’m sure by January, water is flowing down that channel, into the ponds, and into our lake! It was a very exciting find.
My walks are also interesting historically. I had a conversation with some friends at Picnic Day last spring about feeling like you’re the first person to ever be in an area. I said that I sometimes felt that way, but every time I started to, I found evidence of previous travelers. This is also true in Lake Joyce, the most remote place I’ve ever been. I can walk for an hour and not see a sign of others, but then the history pops up.
.jpg)
The remnants of a broken thermometer on a fan with a polygonal fracture running into the background. The middle ground shows one of the ponds that flowed into Lake Joyce and the Catspaw Glacier caps the mountain.
This area was actually the focus of a study by the New Zealand Antarctic Program. How do we know they were from New Zealand?
.jpg)
They left some supplies.
There are also more subtle signs of previous scientists, like this rebar survey stake.
.jpg)
There is also a mystery weather station that no one seems to know who left. We’d like the data!
The history of Pearse Valley discoveries extends back decades, and we’re adding ours to that history. We aren’t the first people here, but we are the first to make some of the scientific observations we’re working on. I don’t mind not being first. I am happy to be here, learning what I can from an interesting lake in a beautiful environment.
