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Palaeodrainage of the southern margin of the Caledonian mountain chain in the northern British Isles

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2011

J. B. Simon  and
B. J. Bluck
J. B. Simon
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Eire
B. J. Bluck
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QO, Scotland
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Abstract

Lower Old Red Sandstone drainage of the Caledonian mountain chain in the northern British Isles converged in the region of the present North Channel between Scotland and Ireland. Calculations of possible catchment area of this drainage network suggest a major river system c. 530 km in length comparable to parts of the present day drainage network of the Himalayas. Evidence from the Lower Old Red Sandstone sedimentary assemblages in Northern Ireland and Scotland indicates that tributaries flowed NE and SW parallel to the Caledonian mountain front. These tributaries joined a trunk stream which flowed southward from present western Scotland through the southern part of the present Inner Hebrides region, and on through the region of the present North Channel and terminated in the contemporaneous Devonian sea. The coastline of this sea stretched E-W across southern Britain.

The essential drainage system established in Lower Old Red Sandstone times became re- established in Upper Old Red Sandstone times, but with a channel network with palaeoflow to the NE in Scotland. This probably joined a southerly flowing trunk stream in the North Sea region, possibly parallel with the western Scotland-Irish Sea drainage.

Keywords

Antrimcatchment areaconglomeratefaultHimalayasprovenance
Type
Research Article
Information
Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of The Royal Society of Edinburgh , Volume 73 , Issue 1 , 1982 , pp. 11 - 15
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1982

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