Beach and related features

8.4.3. Bars, Spits and Tombolo

These are ridges of sand, pebbles or mud.

♤ Bar is such ridge which has joined two headlands cutting across a bay. (see figure) .Sand bars that obtain a length of hundreds of kilometres are called offshore bars or longshore bars.

♤ Offshore bars may enclose a water body to form a lagoon, such as the Chilka Lake and Pulicat Lake in India. (Laggons are referred as Kayals in Kerala).

♤ If bars are formed in such a way that one end is linked to land and the other end projects into the sea, they are called spits.

♤ A connecting bar that joins two landmasses (mainland to island) is known as a tombolo. (see figure 8)