Chesil Beach Investigation

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Andrew Blunn 12TRA

Chesil Beach Investigation

Hypothesis 1. The size of the pebbles will get BIGGER as you move to the LANDWARD side of Chesil Beach.

Hypothesis 2. The slope angle will INCREASE as you move to the LANDWARD side.

Hypothesis 3. The pebble size at the western end of Chesil Beach (Abbotsbury) will be BIGGER than the eastern end (Fortuneswell).

        Our aim when we got to Chesil Beach was to: -

  1. Look for a change in the size of the pebbles along our transect and,
  2. To look for a change in the slope angle along our transect.

To achieve these aims we inserted two ranging rods, five metres apart from each other with the tape measure, along our transect (making sure that the top of the aluminium spike, where it meets the rod, was at ground level). We decided to put them 5 metres a part, as going to Chesil Beach before to carry out an initial inspection; from this initial inspection we also decided that we should measure the pebble size every metre. We then aligned the gun clinometer, which is a device used to measure slope angles, with the bottom of the top marker on the foresight rod. We aimed the clinometer whilst making sure the sights were in line, at the bottom of the top marker on the backsight, we repeated this process to verify that no mistakes had occurred while obtaining the slope angle.

When the two ranging rods are in place we also measure the size of the pebbles. We measure a pebble every metre along our transect with a ruler. We measure the length, width and depth of each pebble in millimetres. Once the results have been recorded in our data tables, we move from the seaward side to the landward side of our transect by another five metre; and repeat the procedure of measuring the slope angle with the gun clinometer and the pebble size with the ruler.

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Once we reach the landward side of Chesil Beach, we calculated the average size index at each site (every 5 metres) at Abbotsbury. To do this we added the length, width and depth of each pebble then divided the sum by 3 to get the average pebble size for each of the pebbles, we then added these 5 totals for each site and divide by 5. When this has been accomplished we then calculated the average size index for the whole of Chesil Beach at the Abbotsbury end. To attain this we added together the average size index of each ...

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