Cavagnöö Glacier (Cavagnoli Glacier; Cavagnöö area; Cavagnoli area), Robièi (Alpe di Robièi; Lake Robièi area), Bavona Valley, Cevio, Vallemaggia, Ticino, Switzerlandi

Regional Level Types
Cavagnöö Glacier (Cavagnoli Glacier; Cavagnöö area; Cavagnoli area)	Mountain Area
Robièi (Alpe di Robièi; Lake Robièi area)	- not defined -
Bavona Valley	Valley
Cevio	Municipality
Vallemaggia	District
Ticino	Canton
Switzerland	Country

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Ghiacciaio dei Cavagnöö (or Ghiacciaio dei Cavagnoli) is located in the valley flanked on the north by Pizzo Cavagnöö (2836 m), Bocchetta di Formazzora (2686 m), and Pizzo San Giacomo (2924 m); on the west by Passo del Cavagnöö (2880 m) and Marchhorn (2962 m), on the south by Pizzo Fiorina (2924 m), Pizzo dei Matörgn (2903 m), and Pizzo dell'Arzo (2755 m). The glacier has experienced a dramatic reduction of its surface and volume. Around 1850 it occupied almost the entire length of the valley (its frontal moraine at 2260-2270 m was submerged by Lake Cavagnoli after the dam was built in 1967); in 1930 the glacier still had a surface of ca. 2.5 km² but the exposed surface of the ridge descending northeastwards from Pizzo dei Matörgn grew to split a section of ice off, forming a smaller separate glacier in the cirques to the west and north of Pizzo dell'Arzo. In 2003 the upper part of the main glacier, between 2500 e 2850 m a.s.l., split into two branches: the so-called "Ghiacciaio di Fiorina" in the southwest and "Ghiaccio Morto", a body of dead ice with three deep depressions, in the east. In this area between 1929 and 2005 the glacier lost 45 to 100 m in thickness and its terminus retrated ca. 600 m. Presently, the so-called "Ghiacciaio di Fiorina", located in the cirque below Pizzo Fiorina - Marchhorn - Pizzo San Giacomo and above two newly formed glacial lakes, is still considered active in spite of a continuous loss of glacial ice.


The first report on the minerals from this area was published by Taddei (1937). However, it was only at the end of the 1960s, thanks to the cable car lines opened because of the Cavagnoli and Robièi dam construction, that the area became more accessible to mineral collectors. Due to the glacier retreat, a large number of mineralized clefts has been discovered. The main rock in the area is a conglomerate gneiss of the Lebendun nappe, in which the mineralised clefts are almost exclusively lined with smoky quartz, adularia, and muscovite crystals. Fissures developed in the contact zones of conglomerate gneiss with marble, dolostone, and schists show a more complex paragenesis including titanite, tourmaline, rutile, anatase, xenotime, euclase etc.

The most known clefts in the area of the main glacier are located:
- west of the point at 2705 m (ridge descending northeastwards from Pizzo dei Matörgn);
- northwest of the point at 2705 m between "Ghiacciaio di Fiorina" and "Ghiaccio Morto";
- west of the point at 2561 m (ridge descending northeastwards from Pizzo dei Matörgn);
- between the points at 2705 m and 2561 m. Irregular clefts and cavities occur at the contact of amphibolite lenses with conglomerate gneiss or in their vicinity;
- in the brown glacial island at 2710 m (now completely exposed; Swiss coordinates 679395 / 144905). It contains the so-called "Buco degli Anziani" (2692 m a.s.l.), discovered in August 1998 and consisting of a man-made arquate entrance into a quartz vein; excluding some quartz crystals at the entrance, the crystals were removed from the cleft in ancient times, certainly before the Little Ice Age.

Mineral List

Mineral list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities

23 valid minerals.

Rock Types Recorded

Rock list contains entries from the region specified including sub-localities