336 GLACIAL FORMATIONS OF ERIE AND OHIO BASINS. 



It seems probable that the ice sheet had melted away from the portion 

 of the Little Miami Valley below the point where this belt of gravel con- 

 nects with the river before the gravel deposition occurred, for latitude and 

 the heat radiated from an extensive land surface would favor melting there, 

 while the ice sheet still held its ground in the part of the reentrant to the 

 north. 



There are gravel aprons associated with morainic knolls and ridges 

 along this part of the Little Miami which are probably somewhat older than 

 the long belt of gravel just disciissed. The most conspicuous is the plain 

 immediately west of Xenia, known as "Cherry Bottoms." There is also a 

 small gravel plain east of Spring Valley. The Cherry Bottoms plain 

 rises toward the moraine which borders it on the north and west, and fits 

 about its knolls and ridges. It also contains numei'ous basins along the 

 border next the moraine. This gravel plain is now di'ained southward to 

 the Little Miami, through a valley utilized by the Little Miami Railway in 

 rising from the river valley to Xenia. It is not certain whether the glacial 

 Avaters followed this route or passed southward to Caesars Creek along the 

 ice margin; perhaps both routes were used in the course of the formation of 

 the moraine. 



The small gravel plain east of Spring Valley stands at its western 

 border more than 100 feet above tlie Little Miami River. There is a bed 

 of gravelly knolls along this border which overlook Spring Valley and 

 serve as a water parting between the Little Miami and Caesars Creek; and 

 south from there a till ridge causes the water to run from within one-half 

 mile of the blufi" of the Little Miami eastward to Caesars Creek. It is 

 probable that the glacial waters which formed this gravel plain, like those 

 of the present system of drainage, escaped through Caesars Creek. 



On the west side of the Little Miami, 1 to 2 miles below Spring Valley, 

 there is a small gravel plain which, though it lies near the inner border of 

 the moraine, was probably formed by waters of glacial age. It stands 

 fully 100 feet above the river, extends back about one-half mile from the 

 bluff, and is a mile or more in length. There seems to be no terrace of 

 corresponding height along the Little Miami below this plain. Its origin is 

 therefore not clearly understood. 



Near the mouth of Caesars Creek there are, on the east side of the 

 river, gravel beds at levels about 150 feet above the stream but they are 



