Hooker Glacier is one of several

glacier A glacier (; ) is a persistent body of dense ice that is constantly moving under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires distinguishing features, such a ...

s close to the slopes of

Aoraki / Mount Cook Aoraki / Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand. Its height, as of 2014, is listed as . It sits in the Southern Alps, the mountain range that runs the length of the South Island. A popular tourist destination, it is also a favourite ...

in the

Southern Alps The Southern Alps (; officially Southern Alps / Kā Tiritiri o te Moana) is a mountain range extending along much of the length of New Zealand's South Island, reaching its greatest elevations near the range's western side. The name "Southern ...

of New Zealand. It is not as large as its neighbour, the Tasman Glacier, measuring 11 kilometres (roughly 6–7 miles) in length.

Etymology

The geographic Hooker items were named by the Canterbury provincial geologist,

Julius von Haast Sir Johann Franz Julius von Haast (1 May 1822 – 16 August 1887) was a German-born New Zealand explorer, geologist, and founder of the Canterbury Museum in Christchurch. Early life Johann Franz Julius Haast was born on 1 May 1822 in Bo ...

, after the English botanist

William Jackson Hooker Sir William Jackson Hooker (6 July 178512 August 1865) was an English botanist and botanical illustrator, who became the first director of Kew when in 1841 it was recommended to be placed under state ownership as a botanic garden. At Kew h ...

Description

The glacier starts on the south-western slopes of

Aoraki/Mount Cook Aoraki / Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand. Its height, as of 2014, is listed as . It sits in the Southern Alps, the mountain range that runs the length of the South Island. A popular tourist destination, it is also a favouri ...

, with its tributaries Sheila Glacier, Empress Glacier, and Noeline Glacier. Hooker Glacier runs south from there until its terminus at

Hooker Lake Hooker Lake is a proglacial lake that started to form in the late 1970s by the recent retreat of the Hooker Glacier. It is in the Hooker Valley, in the Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park in New Zealand's South Island, just south of Aoraki / Mo ...

. The glacial water from the lake is the source of the Hooker River, a small tributary of the

Tasman River The Tasman River is an alpine braided river flowing through Canterbury, in New Zealand's South Island. The river's headwaters are in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park, where it is the outflow of the proglacial Tasman Lake. It is also fed by th ...

, which flows into

Lake Pukaki Lake Pukaki is the largest of three roughly parallel alpine lakes running north–south along the northern edge of the Mackenzie Basin on New Zealand's South Island. The others are Lakes Tekapo and Ohau. All three lakes were formed when the te ...

. One of New Zealand's more accessible glaciers, the glacier and its terminus can be seen clearly from the end of the

Hooker Valley Track The Hooker Valley Track is the most popular short walking track within the Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park in New Zealand. At only length and gaining only about in height, the well formed track can be walked by tourists with a wide range of ...

. This easy walk to the glacier lake is the most popular in the region. For serious trampers and mountaineers, there are three huts along the glacier further up the valley: Hooker Hut, Gardiner Hut, and Empress Hut. The current glacier lake only started to form in the 1970s, left behind as Hooker Glacier retreated. Like many of the glaciers in the Southern Alps, Hooker Glacier is rapidly melting, with the glacier lake projected to grow as the terminus retreats until it reaches the glacier bed about 4 kilometres upstream from the current terminus.

References

{{reflist Landforms of Canterbury, New Zealand Glaciers of New Zealand Southern Alps Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park

Etymology

Description

See also

References