Slieve Mish Mountains

Slieve Mish Mountains
Slieve Mish Mountains from across the Tralee Bay in the village of Fenit
Highest point
Peak	Baurtregaum[1][2]
Elevation	851 m (2,792 ft)[1][2]
Coordinates	52°12′N 9°46′W / 52.200°N 9.767°W / 52.200; -9.767
Dimensions
Length	19 km (12 mi) East–West
Width	6 km (3.7 mi)
Area	97.9[3] km2 (37.8 sq mi)
Naming
Native name	Sliabh Mis
English translation	[possibly] mountains of Mis
Geography
Slieve Mish Mountains Location of Slieve Mish Mountains
Location	County Kerry
Country	Ireland
Provinces of Ireland	Munster
Topo map	OSI Discovery 71
Geology
Rock age	Ordovician to Late Carboniferous[4]
Rock type	Purple cross-bedded sandstone[2]

Slieve Mish Mountains (Irish: Sliabh Mis, meaning '[possibly] mountains of Mis'),^[5] is a predominantly sandstone mountain range at the eastern end of the Dingle Peninsula in County Kerry, Ireland. Stretching 19 kilometres (12 miles), from the first major peak of Barnanageehy outside of Tralee in the east, to Cnoc na Stuaice in near Central Dingle in the west, the range has over 17 material peaks (e.g. height above 100 m), with the core of the mountain range based around the massif of its highest peak, Baurtregaum, and its deep glacial valleys of Derrymore Glen and Curraheen Glen.

The Irish language term "Sliabh" denotes a mountain, however, the precise meaning of "Mis" has not been validated. Irish academic Paul Tempan notes that it could be related to Slemish mountain in County Antrim, where the term "Mis" is from a female name, and thus translates as "the mountains of Mis".^[5]

Like many of the mountain ranges in County Kerry, such as the MacGillycuddy Reeks in the Iveragh Peninsula, the Slieve Mish Mountains are composed predominantly of Devonian period Old Red Sandstone, with a band of Ordovician period metasediments on the western slopes of the range.^[3][1]

The rocks of the Slieve Mish Mountains and the Brandon Group in the Dingle Peninsula are Ordovician to Late Carboniferous in age, 485 to 330 millions years ago (Ma).^[4]

At the time Ireland was in a hot equatorial setting.^[6] During a 60 million year period, Ireland was the site of a major basin, known as the Munster basin, and Cork and Kerry were effectively a large alluvial floodplain.^[6]

The rocks in the Dinge Peninsula have an earlier, Silurian, shallow marine facies and a later, Devonian, continental red-bed facies. The transition between the two is unconformable or faulted. The island of Inishnabro just off the peninsula is an exception in the area in that the contact between the two facies is conformable.^[4]

The rocks are purple–red due to the oxidation of iron-rich sediments which accumulated in semi-arid climate.^[4] In places they are green from chlorination. These colours are still visible today.^[6] There are virtually no fossils in Old Red Sandstone.^[6] The composition of Old Red Sandstone is variable. Largely fluvial sandstones and conglomerates dominate^[4] and there are mudstones, siltstones. Boulders containing quartz pebbles are visible throughout the range.^[6]

The Palaeozoic rocks of the Dinge Peninsula have been affected by deformations caused by three orogenies (mountain building events) the Early Caledonian (c. 470 Ma) Acadian (c. 400 Ma) and Variscan (c. 318–297 Ma) orogenies. The Variscan orogeny uplifted and deformed the Devonian and Early Carboniferous rocks, tightened the folds of the Caledonian and Acadian orogenies and reactivated many of the older major faults. Very large NE-SE trending (in the west) and E-W trending (in the east) open upright folds were created in the Dinge Peninsula. The Slieve Mish Anticline in the east provides evidence of this. The erosional products of this were deposited in the Munster Basin.^[4]

The Slieve Mish range was also subject to significant glaciation with corries (e.g. the upper lakes of the Derrymore Glen), U-shaped valleys (e.g. the Derrymore Glen and the Curraheen Glen), however the range does not have the sharp rocky arêtes and ridges of the MacGillycuddy Reeks range.^[6]

Overlooking Tralee Bay on the northern side and Dingle Bay on the south, the range extends for 19 kilometres from just outside Tralee in the east to the centre of the Dingle Peninsula in the west. The range is often described as the "backbone" of the Dingle Peninsula because of distribution of most of its major peaks along narrow south-west to north-east "spine" that extends to 6 kilometres at its widest part.^[7][8]

The core of the range is the massif of its highest point Baurtregaum 851 metres (2,792 ft), and the main peaks of the range sit and Baurtregaum's high grassy ridge from Baurtregaum Far NW Top 603 metres (1,978 ft)in the east, to Caherconree 835 metres (2,740 ft), and Gearhane 792 metres (2,598 ft), in the west.^{[citation needed]}

Bautregaum has two major glacial U-shaped valleys, the long 4.5-kilometre easterly Curraheen Glen (with the Curraheen River), and the shorter but deeper northerly Derrymore Glen (Derrymore River), with its three corrie lakes.^[7][8]

After descending to the north–south mountain pass of Bóthar na gCloch ("road of the stones") to the west, the spine of the range rises up again at Knockbrack 459 metres (1,506 ft) and Lack Mountain 465 metres (1,526 ft), to run in a further south-westerly direction to finish at Cnoc na Stuaice 483 metres (1,585 ft).^[7][8]

The following is a download from the MountainViews Online Database, who list 17 identifiable Slieve Mish peaks with an elevation, or height, above 100 metres

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Slieve Mish Mountains.

• Brandon Group, a mountain range in Dingle Peninsula
• Mountains of the Central Dingle Peninsula, a mountain range in Dingle Peninsula
• Lists of mountains in Ireland
• List of mountains of the British Isles by height
• List of P600 mountains in the British Isles
• List of Marilyns in the British Isles
• List of Hewitt mountains in England, Wales and Ireland