I. 3. PEDOGENIC STUDIES ON SOILS CONTAINING PERMAFROST IN THE MACKENZIE RIVER BASIN

• Main Author: J H Day
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Great Slave Lake; Mackenzie River; Soi; Tuktoyaktuk; Yellowknife; Beaufort Sea; Mackenzie river; permafrost; Slave River
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.535.971; http://pubs.aina.ucalgary.ca/cpc/cpc1-37.pdf

In this paper, the Mackenzie River 'bas in i s defined a s the portion that l i e s north of the approximate southern l imit of discon-tinuous permafros t, e a s t of the main mass 'o f the Cordillera, and west of a line joining F o r t Smith, Yellowknife, F o r t Frankl in a t the wes tern end of Great B e a r Lake and Tuktoyaktuk on the Beaufort Sea. In this region the rocks a r e mainly of Palaeozoic, Ordivician, Devonian and Cretaceous age; they a r e sedimentary and include lime-stone, dolomite, shale and sandstone. The region is mainly low-lying, heavily wooded fo r the most par t, poorly drained with many lakes and widespread muskeg, but the surface he re and there is broken by a number of hil ls o r higher plateaux which r i s e f rom 2,000 to 3,000 feet above the level of the surrounding country. The region was glaciated by the Wisconsin-Laurentian i ce sheet which left l a rge mora ines and thick drift on much of the a r e a. During the final r e t r e a t of the i ce sheet, lakes were widespread. Probably the la rges t lake that was formed was that in the Grea t Slave Lake-Great B e a r Lake basins, and along the topographic low that l i e s between them (1). A southward extension of this lake extended along the Slave River valley, in which direction the lake drained dur-ing i t s ea r ly s tages. Draining of these lakes during deglaciation, followed by isostat ic changes and siltation, has considerably a l te red some of the lakes; siltation is s t i l l i n progress in Great Slave Lake. The following paragraphs outline briefly the h is tory of soi l investigations in this region, and summarize the charac ter i s t ics of the g rea t soi l groups that have been described.