Limeston

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Limestone is one of the worlds most common types of rock. It is a sedimentary rock that forms in shallow
seas under tropical conditions. It is physically tough and resistant and forms upland areas.

Characteristics of Limestone and Processes Occurring

Feature
Chemical
Composition

Description
Limestone is very rich in the chemical calcium carbonate
and is known as a calcareous rock. Most limestone is formed
from the remains of organic matter. This accounts for its
high concentration of calcium carbonate. Chemical
weathering causes it to dissolve, leaving behind very little
rock material to form a soil. This explains why limestone
areas are often bare and rocky, with few trees.
Carbonation: This type of chemical weathering is very
effective because limestone is so rich in calcium carbonate.
Rainwater that has absorbed carbon dioxide from the air
becomes mildly acidic (carbonic acid). This reacts with the
calcium carbonate and causes it to slowly dissolve. Carbon
dioxide is more soluble in cooler conditions.

Structure

Joints and fractures present to allow greater surface area for

erosion and weathering processes to take place.
Frost Action: This is common in temperate regions of the
world. Water can collect in joints and cracks in the
limestone. When it freezes it expands in volume forcing the
crack apart. Repeated cycles of freezing and thawing will
eventually cause fragments of rock to break away.

Permeability

Mass Movement: Occasionally blocks of limestone may

become detached resulting in landslides. Frost action may
be responsible for rockfalls, when individual rock fragments
fall from cliffs.
River Erosion:
Limestone is pervious and water will readily flow through
the joints and along bedding planes sometimes forming flatflowing underground rivers. These rivers are capable of

Diagram

carrying out intensive erosion to form features such as

caverns. On the surface, however, there will be few rivers.
This lack of surface river erosion partly explains why
limestone tends to form upland areas.
Its permeability results in few surface rivers unless the
water table is particularly high.

Landforms
Feature
Surface landforms:
1. Limestone
Pavements

2. Swallow
holes

Description
These are large and generally flat, expose areas of
limestone. Limestone area may be weathered over time to
form limestone pavements. Through a process of chemical
weathering, the joints deepen and widen to form grykes
while rectangular shaped blocks are known as clints.

An enlarged joint down which water plunges as it flows off

an impermeable rock onto limestone. Erosion and
weathering processes often lead to the swallow hole
becoming wide enough for potholers to enter underground
cave systems.
A river may disappear down a swallow hole into a limestone
area.
A sink hole may be a swallow hole. Sink holes are formed by
a combination of erosion and chemical weathering.
Limestone is weathered through the process of solution and
it is the collapse of this surface that creates sink holes. Sink
holes may develop whereby water from rainfall or rivers
actively dissolves the underlying limestone over time.

Diagram

A doline is an enlarged sinkhole and if that doline grows

larger it becomes an uvala.

Underground
landforms:
1. Caverns and
caves

2. Stalactites,
stalagmites
and pillars

As water flows along joints and bedding planes, it is often

combines into small spaces. This increases water pressure
and can enable the water to be a powerful erosive force,
carving passages and enlarging them to form underground
caverns. In the formation of caverns, processes of
carbonation and solution also air in enlarging joints.
When the water eventually reappears at the surface as a
resurgence (spring), it often forms a cave. (A cave has an
opening to the outside whereas the cavern is totally
enclosed underground).
Subterranean limestone features form as a result of rivers
flowing underground. These rivers, through the process of
carbonation dissolve calcium carbonate in the limestone
and carry it away in solution. When the water carries a high
concentration of calcium carbonate, features such as
stalactites, stalagmites and pillars are formed.
Stalagmites are formed due to the growing of calcium
carbonate from the cave floor.
Stalactites are formed as a result of the growth of calcium
carbonate dripping from the roof of the cave.
Pillars are formed where stalagmites and stalactites join
each other.
A resurgent stream occurs where the stream that has
disappeared down the sinkhole reappears at the surface due

to the stream or river meeting an impermeable rock layer.

Karst Landforms
Feature
Cockpit Karst

Description
This is characterised by rounded conical hills rising up
to about 150m in height separated by depressions
called cockpits.
Process:
1. The limestone has a criss-cross pattern of joints.
2. The rock nearest to the joints is dissolved fastest,
because this is where water collects.
3. A deep, star-shaped depression is formed where
two joints meet.
4. Small conical hills remain away from the joints.
Where the jointing is regular, the hills are
arranged in rows.
This landscape is thought to result from intensive
chemical weathering that is focused on widened joints
and solution holes to create the cockpits.
River erosion during time of higher water tables may
have contributed to the formation of the cockpits as
well as the collapse of roofs of underground caverns.

Tower Karst

This has a much more variable relief, with the hills

rising to a range of different heights. The hills are often

Diagram

steep-sided and may have caves and solution notches

at their base. Tower karst may represent a landscape
that has developed from cockpit karst. The tropical
conditions lead to active weathering and erosion
eventually causing the towers to break apart and
collapse. The land in-between the towers becomes flat
as the cockpits are in-filled with sediment.
The widening and deepening of the cockpits have
destroyed much of the limestone above the water
table. Only a few limestone towers remain, sticking up
from a flat plain of sediments that have filled in the
cockpits at a level just above the water table.
Eventually, the towers will be entirely eroded and will
disappear.