Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Geography & Environmental Studies

Faculty/School

Faculty of Arts

First Advisor

Houston Saunderson

Advisor Role

Thesis Supervisor

Abstract

The Lake Wisconsin glaciofluvial deposits in Woolwich and Pilkington townships are examined for the purpose of environmental reconstruction and the establishment of the paleocurrent patterns. Sediment grain size and primary sedimentary structure are used to define sedimentary facies of environmental studies while the distribution of indicator pebbles, trends in clast size reduction and primary sedimentary structures and employed for paleocurrent analysis. The exposures most representative of the depositional sequences encountered are examined and provide an impression of the sedimentological characteristics of the various glaciofluvial deposits.

Three distinctive types of glaciofluvial deposits can be identified on the basis of surface morphology and sedimentological characteristics. The ice-contact esker deposits form sharp-crested sinuous ridges and exhibit a central core of coarse massive gravel flanked occasionally by finer facies types. The proglacial outwash deposits are topographically flat to gently rolling and although crude horizontally stratified drift is disntiguishable from esker deposits by the irregular hummocky terrain and the frequency with which coarse gravels occur in a tabular cross-bedded form.

Paleocurrent analysis reveals two ancient paleoflow systems. One system, associated with the esker and outwash deposits in the east, exhibits an east-west flow trend while the other system reveals a north-south component of flow coincident with the Elmira moraine and the adjacent outwash deposits. The two systems converge centrally and adopt a southwesterly flow direction. This information corresponds with independent evidence for a Lake Huron-Georgian Bay ice lobe and a Lake Ontario ice lobe and their subsequent withdrawal from the interlobate area toward their respective sources north and east.

Convocation Year

1976

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