Slickensides

In soil, stress fractures formed by masses of high shrink, swell clay sliding past one another due to changes in soil water content. Slickensides are normally found at a depth of greater than 50 cm.

Easily recognised by that most underused of senses, touch. A slickenside surface will be very smooth in one direction, and extremely rough to the touch in the opposite direction. Hence, the name sounds like 'Slick side'.

Slick"en*sides` (?), n.

1.

The smooth, striated, or partially polished surfaces of a fissure or seam, supposed to have been produced by the sliding of one surface on another.

2.

A variety of galena found in Derbyshire, England.

© Webster 1913.