Lime Stone Facts

Streams and rainwater absorb carbon dioxide gas from soil and air. It turns them into weak carbonic acid.
Carbonic acid corrodes (wears away by dissolving) limestone in a process called carbonation.
When limestone rock is close to the surface, carbonation can create spectacular scenery.
Corroded limestone scenery is often called karst, because the best example of it is the Karst Plateau near Dalmatia, in Bosnia.
On the surface, carbonation eats away along cracks to create pavements, with slabs called clints. The slabs are separated by deeply etched grooves called grykes.
Limestone rock does not soak up water like a sponge. It has massive cracks called joints, and streams and rainwater trickle deep into the rock through these cracks.
Limestone is usually white, cream, grey or yellow.
Streams drop down into limestone through swallow-holes, like bathwater down a plughole. Carbonation eats out such holes to form giant shafts called potholes.
Some potholes are eaten out to create great funnel-shaped hollows called dolines, up to 100 m across.
Where water streams out along horizontal cracks at the base of potholes, the rock may be etched out into caverns.
Caverns may be eaten out so much that the roof collapses to form a gorge or a large hole called a polje.

This entry is filed under Interesting Facts.