The South Devon coast consists of a southern part which resembles the south coast of Cornwall, developed on overthrust Devonian formations that extend from the Tamar estuary across to Torbay, with some headlands of greenstone and older rock formations, notably the Palaeozoic and Pre-Cambrian schists of Start Point and Bolt Tail, which resemble those of the Lizard in Cornwall. The central section is dominated by red cliffs of Triassic sandstone and mudstone within Torbay and from Teignmouth round to Seaton, and the eastern part by the Cretaceous rocks at the head of Lyme Bay. Much of the coast is steep and cliffed. On the southern part there are slope-over-wall profiles similar to those of Cornwall, with vegetated slopes mantled by periglacial Head deposits and basal cliffs cut in hard rock formations, but the receding cliffs on Triassic sandstone are generally vertical (often with outlying stacks), and the coastal slopes in Cretaceous rocks, irregular as the result of landslides. The...
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(2010). South Devon. In: Bird, E.C.F. (eds) Encyclopedia of the World's Coastal Landforms. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8639-7_70
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