These obelisk like glacial residues are a hallmark of Zuort.

In the course of the last ice age, from about 80,000 to 10,000 years ago, the two glaciers of Val Laver and Val Chöglias melted, their tongues joining just below Zuort. What remained were two glacial debris moraines, exposed to the climate and thus to erosion. Chunks of 50-million-year-old granite or serpentine weighing tons were transported downhill by the ice to the glacier tongues. After it melted, the moraines beneath these boulders were protected from erosion: this is how high pointed debris cones of up to 15 metres in height were formed with their respective boulder as a cap weighing several tonnes. The local name for these towers of moraine debris is ils Cluchers (phonetically: klutchears), the church towers of Zuort.

Woolly mammoth, cave bear and sabre-toothed tiger have disappeared since the recent Ice Age, and Homo sapiens, who migrated from Africa 40,000 years ago, presumably lived as hunter-gatherers in what was then the Lower Engadine 15,000 years ago. And soon discovered and used the terrain around Zuort and the high summer pastures on the Fimber Pass. The green island between the two moraines began to be cleared of rock by hunters of that time, who soon became shepherds and mountain farmers, and to enlarge their pastures by slash-and-burn. These people must also have already known about the earth pyramids, albeit in a different form and in a different place. And already in a hundred years, these and other parts of the moraine will look completely different again.

The internal erosion of the pyramids by seeping freezing water continues and especially the steep fissures of the moraine edge are crumbling away, with corresponding rockfall and falling trees. In addition, fine powdery, sticky clay accumulations have formed in the basin-shaped end spurs of the moraines, which are constantly in motion and can be dangerous traps for humans and animals. It is therefore advisable not to leave the footpath or road in the area of these moraines (clay) and earth pyramids (falling rocks).