Unnamed GlacierA small, steep unnamed glacier lies up a side valley above the left margin of Fountain Glacier. This glacier today is apparently “cold”, frozen to its bed, and runoff is mainly from the surface and sides. The retreating terminal ramp and the cliffs at the true left margin, reveal a range of interesting structures, including a thick layer of basal ice, which may indicate that a more “polythermal” regime may have existed in the past when the glacier was thicker. Some of the stones near the glacier margin show the rough type of striae that are characteristic of cold glaciers. | |||
 A telephoto view of the unnamed glacier seen from the surface of Fountain Glacier. The pale grey areas, show recently exposed ground from glacier recession and the stream courses below. |  Aerial view of the proglacial area, showing the Little Ice Age limit (far left) and a series of small recessional moraines). |  A distant, side-on view of the glacier, showing the ice-marginal cliff face and two steep ramps. |  The true left margin of the glacier, showing a steep cliff and fallen ice blocks. |
 Ice-marginal stream, basal debris layers, basal glacial sediment and small waterfalls. |  A fine example of a basal debris layer is being sampled by Richard Waller. A boulder projects from the ice wall, and the pitted surface indicates where stone have melted out. |  Close-up of the large projecting boulder, showing how the basal ice has deformed around it. |  The ice cliff is overhanging in places and waterfalls in part drop clear of the face, splashing onto the deposited basal debris below. |
 Much of the debris in front of the glacier is angular, and suggestive of passive glacier transport, mainly derived from fractured bedrock. This suggests that the ice may be at least partly frozen to the bed. |  Other evidence that the glacier is cold-based comes from the presence of these rather crude scratch-marks (striations), which differ from the smoothed, striated and polished surfaces from wet-based glaciers. |  A helicopter provides a scale for the small terminal moraine belonging to the Little Ice Age. Tundra vegetation is well-developed outside the moraine, where the helicopter is standing. |  The active stream bed below the unnamed glacier is marked by vegetation-free ground, in contrast to the vegetated banks to the sides. |
| Photos Michael Hambrey, July 2014 | |||