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In Argentina’s Santa Cruz Province, Los Glaciares National Park is a federal protected area. The Los Glaciares National park has 726,927 acres, making it its largest national park. It was founded on May 11, 1937, and it now protects a representative group of Magellanic subpolar woodland or west Patagonian steppe biodiversity. UNESCO designated it as a World Heritage in 1981. The park’s name is derived from the Andes’ massive ice cap, the world’s largest from outside Antarctica, Greenland, and Iceland, which feeds 47 massive glaciers, 13 of which flow into the Pacific Ocean. Glaciers in other world regions begin at an altitude of at least half a million meters above sea level. Still, because of the immensity of an ice cap, those glaciers start at only 1,500 meters and slide down to 200 meters. In Chilean territory, Los Glaciares is bordered in the South by Torres del Paine National Park.
Geography of Los Glaciares National Park
Los Glaciares National Park is 1,101,843 acres (4,459.00 km2) in size. The park is separated into two regions: woods and grasslands in the east and peaks, rivers, and glaciers in the west, with 30 percent of the park covered in ice. Each one relates to one of the park’s two elongated lakes that are partially enclosed inside it. Lake Argentina, Argentina’s largest Lake at 566 sq miles (1,470 km2), lies in the South, whereas Lake At 425 sq miles (1,100 km2), Viedma, is now in the north.
These lakes supply the Santa Cruz River, which flows down to Puerto Santa Cruz’s Atlantic coast. The Zona Centro is a non-touristic zone devoid of lakes between the two parts. Part of Viedma Lakes, including Viedma Glacier with a few lesser glaciers and many popular climbing and hiking mountains, including Mount Fitzroy, the park’s highest point at 3,375 meters (11,070 feet), and Cerro Torre, which make up the park’s northern half.
Glaciers of Los Glaciares National Park
Los Glaciares National Park comes from the numerous glaciers covering roughly half of the land. The property is an excellent example of geological, geomorphic, and physiographic phenomena generated by dynamic glaciation throughout the Quaternary’s Pleistocene epoch and continuing neo glaciations as in the Holocene.
The lacustrine basins with the glacial origin, ancient moraine networks deposited just on plateaux, and more recent systems belonging to the present valleys with their impressive glacier tongues may all be identified due to these occurrences. Many glaciers calving into the ice & milky waters of the massive Lake Argentino are undoubtedly the most striking visual feature.
The famed Perito Moreno Glacier, for example, temporarily raises the water level by blocking a narrow passage formed by Lake Argentino. It results in regular thunderous glacier tongue rupture into the lakes (World Heritage Committee, 2014).
Flora and Fauna
Just on the Argentine side of the range, the mountains trap almost all of the humidity from the Pacific Ocean, allowing only the frigid cold (annual average of 7.5 °C) to pass through, resulting in a dehydrated step. Guanacos (a camelid native to dry, mountainous areas of South America), cougars, chinchillas, pudu & email (two kinds of tiny deer), and grey foxes all live in this area. Foxes have been harmed by the livestock business and are now endangered. While the guanaco is not threatened, large-scale livestock grazing throughout.
Patagonia has severely dropped its historic population. Rheas (giant, flightless birds having long legs and long necks, akin to the ostrich), birds, eagles, torrents ducks, white-throated caracaras & yellow-bridled & black-throated finches are among the area’s over a hundred bird species on the borders of lakes and lagoons, the Magellan oystercatcher breeds. A cordilleran snipe and the austral Rail are two more species that are rarely sighted.
Around 260,000 hectares (642,474 acres) of ice-covered land with no vegetation and another 95,000 hectares (234,750 acres) of lakes. The primary types were lenga (beech) and guido, covering roughly 79,000 hectares (195,213 acres) of the forest. You can find the flora in three distinct habitats: steppe, woodland, and semi-desert highlands.
Conclusion
Los Glaciares National Place is known for its breathtaking scenery and dramatic displays of ongoing and significant glaciations and related phenomena. There is indeed a strong level of natural protection given the nature of these conservation assets, the site’s colossal extent, and the remoteness of, & difficult access to, significant portions of it. From a World Heritage standpoint, its conservation status & prospects are thus favourable. However, there are also concerns about excessive seasonal mass tourism, with tourism infrastructure beginning to impact the landscape’s attractiveness, even though it is mainly located outside the site. Introduced flora and animals have affected the ecology at all periods, without feral cattle being among the most visible instances.
