Great Geology Lunch Spots - No. 1: P-Forms near Knock

Had a bit of time at lunchtime today so I headed off to one of my favourite places - the side of Loch Na Keal, just south of Knock near Scarisdale Point. Its a great viewpoint with good views up and down the loch, but importantly, it is reckoned to be one of the best places in the UK to see glacial P-forms. there is a good JNCC paper on these things with various ideas given as to their formation. You can read it at:

http://jncc.defra.gov.uk/pdf/gcrdb/GCRsiteaccount1438.pdf

They also look neat under heavy frost - there are obvious striae on the  P-Forms and these show up well under frost..

As well as P-forms there are also some rather impressive dykes of the Mull Swarm cutting the shore. There is a huge concentration of these things in this area (similar to Croggan in this repsect) and they are very easy to see as all this geology is right by the road!  A few pics, mainly of the P-Forms:


 A particularly wind blown tree is a good location indicator - behind it is a weathered out dyke

Below are some pictures of the P-Forms, most of these run approximately E -W, which is the direction of the ice flow that carved them out.







the picture above is of one of the dykes that cuts the Palaeogene lavas that make up the shore here. It winds a sinuous path across the rocks. It has also been cored in several places, presumably for palaeomagnetic research.



So there you have it, right beside the road, one of the best locations in the country for seeing these features.
And a great place to stop for lunch!

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