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EAS 100 > L9: Weathering > Flashcards

L9: Weathering Flashcards

1
Q

What is mechanical weathering?

A
  • The physical break-up of rocks without changes in the rocks composition
  • Have many causes, ex.:
    - Rocks having zones of weakness along which they break
    - Temps. Fluctuate above and below freezing so water in the cracks repeatedly expand and freeze, forcing the rocks apart
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2
Q

What is exfoliation?

A

A process in which large sheets of rock are detached from the outcrop

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3
Q

What is frost wedging?

A

Occurs from the expansion of freezing water which exerts an outward force sufficient enough to wedge open a pre-existing crack and split the rock

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4
Q

What is the principle effect of mechanical weathering?

A

The break up of large chunks of rock into smaller ones and therefore increasing

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5
Q

What is chemical weathering

A
  • Involves the breakdown of minerals by chemical reaction with water or gases in either the atmosphere/pore-waters
  • Dependent on the rock composition and the climate we’re in
  • Least stable = weathers faster
  • More stable = weathers slower
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6
Q

The more ________ you have, the greater the weathering will be. What is the impact of this?

A
  • Surface area

- Smaller pieces will weather fast bc greater surface area

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7
Q

What are the 2 most important factors related to chemical weathering?

A
  • Parent material

- Climate

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8
Q

Describe parent material

A
  • Minerals differ in the kinds of chemical reactions they undergo
  • High temperature formed minerals are least stable at surface, oxygenated conditions
  • Whereas secondary minerals are most-stable
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9
Q

Describe climate in regards to chemical weathering

A
  • Climate plays a major role in the intensity of chemical weathering
  • Chemical reactions require water; the more water = the more intense the chemical weathering
  • Most chemical reactions proceed more rapidly at high temperatures than colder temperatures
  • Also dictated by compositional material and climate
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10
Q

How is clay formed?

A

From the weathering or preexisting minerals

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11
Q

What are the 2 types of biological weathering

A

Mechanical

Chemical

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12
Q

What is biological weathering?

A

break that shit down biologically

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13
Q

Mechanical weathering

A
  • Action of tree roots in splitting the rock apart

- Roots pull into rock and increase SA

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14
Q

Chemical weathering

A

Organic acids are produced through decaying vegetation (ex. Carbonic acid)

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15
Q

What forms soil?

A

Biomass weathering

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16
Q

Define erosion

A

The action of surface processes that removes soil, rock, or dissolved materials from one location on earth’s surface and then transport it to another

17
Q

What are the 4 methods of transportation?

A
  • Gravity
  • Water
  • Ice
  • Wind
18
Q

Gravity

A
  • Typically the material that accumulates at the bottom of landslides collectively known as “colluvium”
  • Material travels to the bottom
  • Aids in forming soil
19
Q

Water

A

Have deposits known as alluvium (ricer; stuff that rivers transport), lacustrine (lake), marine (oceans)

20
Q

Ice

A
  • As glacial ice advances, the underlying soils and rock are removed and eroded
  • As ice melts and glacier retreats, the glacial degree/drift remains and provides a new source of material for soil formation
  • Highest energy
21
Q

Wind

A
  • AKA Eolian Deposits
  • Formed via the accumulation of wind blown dust
  • When they’re deprived of glacial material, composed primarily of silt and clay
22
Q

What are the most important stream deposits? Why?

A
  • Floodplains
  • They’re fertile because weathered stuff in a river continues to be carried by the river
  • Acts as a source of settlement because because the land is fertile because material is transported from one place to another
23
Q

Weathering = mechanism that __________. Erosion = mechanism that _________

A
  • Breaks rocks apart

- Moves rocks from one place to another

24
Q

50% of soil = ________. 90% of that = __________

A
  • Solid matter

- Inorganic material

25
Q

What is a soil profile

A

Vertical sequence of horizons

26
Q

What are soil horizons?

A

Organization of soil properties into layers that change vertically in depth

27
Q

What types of soils end up with layers?

A

Homogeneous soils

28
Q

What leads to soil formation?

A

All 3 weathering processes and erosion

29
Q

What zone has the most accumulation?

A

The D layer

EAS 100 (17 decks)

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