Bartlett Pond is a pond in the Manomet section of

Plymouth, Massachusetts Plymouth (; historically known as Plimouth and Plimoth) is a town in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, United States. Located in Greater Boston, the town holds a place of great prominence in American history, folklore, and culture, and is known as ...

. The inflow of the pond is Beaver Dam Brook, and the outflow is an unnamed river that empties into

Cape Cod Bay A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. Th ...

. White Horse Beach nearly surrounds the pond, lying to the southwest, west and north. Manomet Heights lies on the eastern shore.

Geology

Bartlett Pond has water depths of slightly over a meter. The bottom of the pond is made up of fine silt and clay muds with large cobbles, clasts and boulders in some places left behind by the retreat of the glaciers. In a study conducted by

University of Massachusetts-Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, i ...

in 2013 and again in 2014,

X-ray fluorescence X-ray fluorescence (XRF) is the emission of characteristic "secondary" (or fluorescent) X-rays from a material that has been excited by being bombarded with high-energy X-rays or gamma rays. The phenomenon is widely used for elemental analysis ...

data shows slightly higher abundance of

lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

and

zinc Zinc is a chemical element with the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. Zinc is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodi ...

within the upper 50 centimeters of sediment cores taken out of the pond. These elements are common in the shallowest sediments of many ponds throughout the Northeast US, left behind by industrial pollution and leaded gas emissions. The elements

strontium Strontium is the chemical element with the symbol Sr and atomic number 38. An alkaline earth metal, strontium is a soft silver-white yellowish metallic element that is highly chemically reactive. The metal forms a dark oxide layer when it is ex ...

and

calcium Calcium is a chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. As an alkaline earth metal, calcium is a reactive metal that forms a dark oxide-nitride layer when exposed to air. Its physical and chemical properties are most similar to ...

are associated with seawater, sand, and small fragments of shells and reefs washed ashore during large storms. X-ray fluorescence shows spikes in both elements at certain points associated with layers of sand in the mud. These sand layers may be storm

overwash Overwash is the flow of water and sediment over a coastal dune or beach crest during storm events (or other situations with high water). 'Overwash' may refer only to the landward flux of water due to overtopping of a dune system while 'washover' may ...

from hurricanes in Massachusetts Bay over the past 700 years.

References

*McCarthy Earls, E. (2014). Sedimentary survey of Bartlett Pond, White Horse Beach & Tidmarsh Farms. UMASS-Amherst, Department of Geosciences.

External links

South Shore Coastal Watersheds - Lake Assessments
Ponds of Plymouth, Massachusetts Ponds of Massachusetts {{PlymouthCountyMA-geo-stub