Abstract:

Kaçkar Mountain, which is located in the highest part of East Black Sea Mountains with the height of 3932 m, has quite rough topography due to neotectonic activity in east pontid zone. Kaçkar Mountain was affected from the Pleistocene glaciations and especially it has typical glacial erosion and deposition landforms based on last glaciations occurred nearly 18,500 years ago. These landforms are typical examples of glacial topography in Turkey and they have not been damaged. Nevertheless, this area contains glacial, periglacial and fluvial topography together as polycyclic and polygenic character. Although these factors and processes effected to north and south slopes of Kaçkar Mountain are the same, glacial and periglacial landforms in both sides developed in different sizes and characters due to aspect effect. The main goal of the study is to expose the effect of aspect in development of glacial and periglacial topography at the north and south slopes of Kaçkar Mountain. For this purpose, numerical analyses have been used by using Geographical Information System (GIS) with preparation topographic and hydrographical data base and their spatial, morphometric and hydrometric analysis. The results of numerical analysis of study area were supported and compared with field works carried out in 3 different years. Finally, this study reveals that the differences of glacial and periglacial topography at the north and south slopes of Kaçkar Mountain aspect is a vital factor. Keywords: Glacial and periglacial topography, polycyclic and polygenic topography, morphometric analysis, Kaçkar Mountain.

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