What is a boulder? Is this material of natural or artificial origin? What does it look like, where is it used? In this article you will find answers to all these questions. In addition, here we will talk about one of the most unusual objects of the Belarusian capital.
What is a boulder?
Various exogenous forces: wind, water, air, glaciers constantly “work” on the appearance of the earth’s surface. As a result of all these influences, the whole masses of rocks are gradually destroyed, forming clastic material of various sizes and characteristics - pebbles, gravel, crushed stone, sand, gravel and others. A boulder is one of the varieties of clastic rocks. It will be discussed in our article.
What is a boulder? This is a fairly well-rounded block of rock, the diameter of which (along the long axis) exceeds 256 millimeters. The shape of the boulder is usually round, or close to that. The rounding of these stone blocks can be associated with corrosion, water or glacial erosion.
Boulder stones differ from each other in shape, size and color. It all depends on what kind of rock they are made of, what were the conditions for their direct formation. Most often, quartz, sandstone and granite boulders are found in nature.
The main types of boulders
Based on the genesis (origin), all boulders are divided into several types.
- Alluvial - rock fragments formed by permanent natural watercourses.
- Proluvial - stone deposits that accumulate at the foot of mountain ranges as a result of washing off weathering products from the slopes.
- Colluvial - boulders and boulders formed as a result of landslides or mountain screes.
- Erratic - rock fragments carried away by the glacier at considerable distances from the place of their "geological homeland". This is the most common group of boulders. In large numbers, they can be found in Scotland, Canada, Poland, Latvia, and Altai.
The largest boulder in the world is located in the Mojave Desert (USA). The height of this solid stone giant is about 15 meters. The place where the stone lies has long been considered mystical. Many outstanding personalities have been here more than once, in particular, the famous inventor Nikola Tesla.
Boulders in our time are widely used in the construction of residential buildings, river dams and foundations, for the decoration of walls and pools. They are indispensable for strengthening earthen slopes and embankments. A natural boulder is a landscape designer’s best friend! With it, you can equip a beautiful "alpine slide" in the garden, or cover an unsightly sewer manhole.
Museum of Boulders in Minsk
The importance of these stones for studying the geological history of the region was first realized by Belarusian scientists. In 1976, they established a scientific expedition, which collected more than two thousand stone blocks from different parts of Belarus. All of them were collected in one place - a park on the eastern outskirts of Minsk.
The Museum of Boulders in the Belarusian capital is unique in its kind. After all, here you can not only get interesting information about certain rocks. The unusual and the territory of the museum itself, which exactly repeats the physical map of Belarus. The state border of the country is indicated by a short bush. Paths and paths are the main rivers of the republic, and the mounds are its hills.
Another curious fact: all the boulders of the Minsk open-air museum are located exactly in those places of the “map”, from where they were brought in due time by geologists.