Dolomite
If I touch this stone, will it crumble?
Dolomite is very brittle, and the fissured structure is called joints. The rock looks like limestone, but also contains magnesium and is harder.
Dolomite is weathered by water and frost, creating huge scree slopes. It gave the Engadine Dolomites their name. 80 percent of the rocks in the National Park are dolomite.
The whole thing reminds me of ballast under the tracks.
Yes, and only a small amount of fine material is produced. But that’s what it would take for fertile soil to form. So it’s no wonder that not much grows on dolomite.
Did the Engadine Dolomites also originate in a sea?
Yes. The more than 1000 m thick dolomite rocks were deposited at the time of the first dinosaurs – in the lagoons in the marginal zone of an ocean.
Typical dolomite rocks
