Enlarge image
1/10
Anyone who has ever hiked or skied on a glacier knows how fascinating the ice masses can be.
Photographer Bernhard Edmaier photographed specimens in the highest mountain range in Central Europe for his photo book »Alpeneis«.
The images show the glaciers during the summer months when the ice is naturally receding.
Seen here is the Gornergletscher in the Valais Alps, Switzerland.
Enlarge image
2 / 10
"In the flat area of the glacier tongue, a meltwater flow gradually cuts into the ice mass in meanders," Edmaier writes about another image of the glacier from 2011. A frequently observed phenomenon can be seen there: Smaller stones on the ice heat up in the sun and melt holes into it.
Photo: Bernhard Edmaier
Enlarge image
3/10
Val Sassa, Engadine Alps, Switzerland: At 2.5 kilometers, the rock glacier is the longest in the high mountains.
The ice masses cut through the terrain and appear as a frozen stream of debris.
As a result of climate change, glaciers are no longer shrinking only in summer, but are losing mass overall.
Edmaier has been recording on and off for more than two decades.
Photo: user
Enlarge image
4/10
Mountain lovers recognize it immediately: the Matterhorn in the Valais Alps with its glacier.
Experts monitor the temperature in the rock with probes.
Half a meter deep in the rock on the north side seen here, the average annual temperature is around minus 12 degrees Celsius, Edmaier has researched.
Wherever the sun shines, temperatures average between minus 4 and minus 2 degrees.
The temperature differences trigger stresses in the rock, and rockfalls occur again and again.
Enlarge image
5/10
Vedretta di Fellaria orientale, Bernina Group, Italy: Here the glacier melt can be clearly seen.
Around 100 years ago, the ice filled the entire valley, reports Edmaier.
In 2005, a depression formed by the glacier formed a lake that has continued to grow as the ice retreats.
The recording is from July 2021.
Enlarge image
6 / 10
A glacier can hardly be seen here.
Only a few patches of ice remain from the masses of ice on the Watzmann in the Berchtesgaden Alps in Germany.
The photo was taken in July 2010. In 2020, the plaques were still almost three meters thick on average and "will soon be gone," writes Edmaier.
Photo: user
Enlarge image
7/10
Glacier de Talèfre in the French Mont Blanc massif: the partly glaciated rock section that Edmaier photographed in 2009 is also called the Garden of Talèfre.
Grass and small plants grow here in summer.
Photo: Bernhard Edmaier
Enlarge image
8/10
Traces of a glacier: The Gredetsch Valley in the Bernese Alps in Switzerland is the result of thousands of years of erosion caused by the Gredetsch Valley Glacier.
Its ice dug into the rock until the end of the last great ice age around 10,000 years ago.
A stream now flows through the bottom of the valley.
"Gredetsch comes from D'Gredi, Valais German for 'the straight one'," says Edmaier's book.
Enlarge image
9/10
The pattern that pull, push and shear forces have worked into the Karlingerkees in Austria looks beautiful.
The faster the glacial ice flows over the uneven ground, the more pronounced the cracks and furrows are.
Enlarge image
10/10
A lake district has formed on the apron of the Upper Theodul Glacier in the Valais Alps in Switzerland.
Hollows formed by the retreating glacial ice are filled with water, as this image from 2021 shows. In the coming decades, the water surface will increase, and by 2080 the Upper Theodul Glacier will probably have disappeared completely.
jme
