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The Solway Lowlands and Coast

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Landscapes and Landforms of Scotland

Part of the book series: World Geomorphological Landscapes ((WGLC))

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Abstract

The Solway Lowlands and coast are characterised by a wide variety of glacial and glacifluvial landforms deposited by the British–Irish Ice Sheet during the last glaciation. These landforms display evidence of multiple ice-flow events and readvances of Scottish ice across the Solway Firth Lowlands. They include drumlins, crag-and-tail landforms, ice-contact outwash deposits, eskers and kame terraces. Reworking of terrestrial and submarine glacigenic deposits by waves and tidal currents has provided substantial volumes of sediment, enabling the formation of emerged beaches and estuarine flats (carse) and their modern counterparts of saltmarsh (merse), beaches and dunes. The saltmarshes and tidal sandflats of the inner Solway Firth are amongst the most extensive and well developed in Scotland and owe their development to eastward transport of sediment into the estuary by the dominance of flood tidal currents and a unidirectional wave climate.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G12 8QQ, Scotland, UK

    James D. Hansom

  2. Department of Geography, Durham University, South Road, Durham, DH1 3LE, England, UK

    David J. A. Evans

Authors
  1. James D. Hansom
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  2. David J. A. Evans
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Correspondence to James D. Hansom .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geography and Sustainable Development, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, UK

    Colin K. Ballantyne

  2. School of Geography and Sustainable Development, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, UK

    John E. Gordon

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Hansom, J.D., Evans, D.J.A. (2021). The Solway Lowlands and Coast. In: Ballantyne, C.K., Gordon, J.E. (eds) Landscapes and Landforms of Scotland. World Geomorphological Landscapes. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-71246-4_28

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