mountain glacier

In this discussion the term mountain glaciers includes all perennial ice masses other than the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets. Those ice masses are not necessarily associated with mountains. Sometimes the term small glaciers is used, but only in a relative sense: a…

…sheets, ice caps, and long valley glaciers was among the most significant events of the Pleistocene. During times of extensive glaciation, more than 45 million square km (roughly 17,400,000 square miles), or about 30 percent of Earth’s land area, was covered by glaciers, and portions of the northern oceans either…

…focus on two broad classes: mountain, or valley, glaciers and continental glaciers, or ice sheets, (including ice caps). For information about other types, see the articles ice and glacier.