Geomorphological and morphometric characteristics of former glaciers on Mt. Kısır, Northeast Turkey

Glacial forms, which are products of the cold periods of the Quaternary, are found in many parts of Türkiye. Being a mountainous country, the high parts of Türkiye, which are above the permanent snow line, were occupied by glaciers many times during the Quaternary and some glaciers have survived to the present day despite rapid melting in recent decades. In the parts where the glaciers have completely melted, the shapes of glacial geomorphology have preserved their freshness to a great extent. Although Türkiye's current glacier inventory is considered to be complete, there are still glaciated areas of different sizes that have not yet been identified in the literature. One such area is Mount Kısır, located just west of Lake Çıldır in the far northeast of Türkiye. Glaciated sites there have not been reported in the literature and there is a lack of geomorphological, climatological and chronological information about these sites. Mount Kısır (40°57′ N, 43°04′ E) is a mass of Pliocene andesites with a peak of 3197 m, 35 km southeast of Ardahan. We used topographic maps, UAVs and detailed field studies to map the glacial morphology on Mount Kısır. This established 20 cirques, 10 glacial valleys, prominent lateral moraines on their slopes and frontal moraines descending to 2200 m a.s.l. The main ridge runs north from Mount Kısır with more cirques and glacial valleys on the east slope than on the west. The former glaciers were up to 250 m thick and the longest were 11.8 km in Guvercin Valley and 12 km in Kose Valley, both on the east slope. The next goal of this study is to obtain cosmogenic dating of the glacial deposits of Mount Kısır and to contribute to the modelling of the Quaternary climatic conditions of Türkiye by establishing the relationship between these data and local climatic conditions.

This study was supported by TUBITAK project number 122Y360