Tortoises and hares: dissolution, erosion and isostasy in landscape evolution

Abstract Denudation mechanisms differ fundamentally between limestone and silicate rock types, which are subject to very different rate thresholds and enhancers/inhibitors. Silicates are removed largely by erosion, the mechanical entrainment and transport of particles. This is a relatively high energy, and highly episodic, process which occurs only when a minimum threshold flow velocity is exceeded; it is inhibited by vegetation cover and favoured by strongly seasonal runoff. Limestone is removed largely by chemical dissolution at a rate directly proportional to runoff. Dissolution is a relatively low energy process that can occur at any flow velocity or in static water; in general it is enhanced by vegetation cover and non‐seasonality of runoff. These contrasting factors in the denudation of silicates versus limestone can produce strikingly uneven rates of surface lowering across a landscape, sometimes akin to the well known ‘tortoise and hare race’, where the slow and steady denudation of limestones may in the long term exceed the sometimes rapid, but often localized and episodic, erosion of silicates. Prolonged exposure of limestone to a humid temperate climate in a tectonically stable environment produces low‐relief corrosion plains in which limestone uplands are anomalous and, in most instances, due to recent unroofing from beneath a siliciclastic cover. In a highly seasonal or semi‐arid climate almost the exact inverse may develop, with ‘flashy’ runoff and sparse vegetation favouring erosion rather than dissolution. Even under a constant humid climate progressive unroofing of a thick limestone unit within folded siliciclastics may lead to a topographic inversion over time, with the limestone outcrop always forming a topographic low flanked by siliciclastic uplands. Valleys will be initiated on anticlinal crests, where the limestone is first unroofed, but progressive lowering of the limestone causes these valleys to migrate to their final position in the synclinal troughs. In humid climates isostatic compensation in response to slow, but continuous, denudation of extensive limestone outcrops may be a significant factor in the development of relief on adjacent, more slowly eroding, silicate outcrops. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.