Which landform is described as an elongated ellipsoidal feature formed by glacial flow around an obstruction and deposition of materials on the downstream side?

• A. Esker
• B. Drumlin
• C. Moraine
• D. Kame

Answer: (B)

A drumlin is the landform described. It’s a long, streamlined hill of glacial till that forms when a glacier flows around an obstruction and deposits material on the downstream side, creating an elongated ellipsoidal shape that runs roughly parallel to the ice flow. This process gives drumlins their characteristic blunt upstream end and tapering downstream end, and they often occur in fields indicating the direction of past glacial movement.

Eskers are sinuous ridges formed by sand and gravel deposited by meltwater channels inside or beneath the ice, not by flow around obstacles. Moraines are accumulations of till at glacier margins, forming broader ridges or heaps rather than streamlined ellipsoidal features. Kames are small cone- or mound-shaped hills formed by sediment deposited in crevasses or on the ground beneath or at the edge of the ice.