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Cumberland Plateau
The Cumberland Plateau is the southern part of the Appalachian Plateau in the Appalachian Mountains of the United States. It includes much of eastern Kentucky and Tennessee, and portions of northern Alabama and northwest Georgia. The terms "Allegheny Plateau" and the "Cumberland Plateau" both refer to the dissected plateau lands lying west of the main Appalachian Mountains. The terms stem from historical usage rather than geological difference, so there is no strict dividing line between the two. Two major rivers share the names of the plateaus, with the Allegheny River rising in the Allegheny Plateau and the Cumberland River rising in the Cumberland Plateau in Harlan County, Kentucky. Geography The Cumberland Plateau is a deeply dissected plateau, with topographic relief commonly of about , and frequent sandstone outcroppings and bluffs. At Kentucky's Pottsville Escarpment, which is the transition from the Cumberland Plateau to the Bluegrass in the north and the Pennyril ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pottsville Escarpment
The Pottsville Escarpment is a resistant sandstone belt of cliffs and steep sided, narrow crested valleys in eastern Kentucky, USA. It features rock shelters, waterfalls, and natural bridges. It is also called the Cumberland Escarpment and forms the western edge of the Cumberland Plateau. It is largely located within the Daniel Boone National Forest, the original area of which was located to specifically include this rugged strip of land. Several significant natural areas in Kentucky are located within the escarpment zone. These include the Red River Gorge Geologic Area, Natural Bridge State Park, Cumberland Falls Cumberland Falls, sometimes called the Little Niagara, the Niagara of the South, or the Great Falls, is a waterfall on the Cumberland River in southeastern Kentucky. Spanning the river at the border of McCreary and Whitley counties, the waterfal ..., Big South Fork National Recreation Area, and others. ReferencesGeology of Kentucky Escarpments of the United Stat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tennessee River
The Tennessee River is the largest tributary of the Ohio River. It is approximately long and is located in the southeastern United States in the Tennessee Valley. The river was once popularly known as the Cherokee River, among other names, as the Cherokee people had their homelands along its banks, especially in what are now East Tennessee and northern Alabama. Additionally, its tributary, the Little Tennessee River, flows into it from Western North Carolina and northeastern Georgia, where the river also was bordered by numerous Cherokee towns. Its current name is derived from the Cherokee town, ''Tanasi'', which was located on the Tennessee side of the Appalachian Mountains. Course The Tennessee River is formed at the confluence of the Holston and French Broad rivers in present-day Knoxville, Tennessee. From Knoxville, it flows southwest through East Tennessee into Chattanooga before crossing into Alabama. It travels through the Huntsville and Decatur area before rea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sequatchie Valley
Sequatchie Valley is a relatively long and narrow valley in the U.S. state of Tennessee and, in some definitions, Alabama. It is generally considered to be part of the Cumberland Plateau region of the Appalachian Mountains; it was probably formed by erosion of a compression anticline, rather than rifting process as had been formerly theorized. The Sequatchie River drains the valley in Tennessee, flowing south to southwest from the southern part of Cumberland County, Tennessee to the Tennessee River near the Alabama border. Geologically, the Sequatchie Valley continues south of the Tennessee River into central Alabama. The Tennessee River flows through the Alabama portion of the valley to the vicinity of Guntersville, Alabama. The valley continues south of Guntersville, where it is called Browns Valley, drained by Browns Creek (Thornbury 1965:148). Although this whole valley is geologically the same, the name Sequatchie is commonly used only for the Tennessee portion of the val ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sand Mountain (Alabama)
Sand Mountain is a sandstone plateau in northeastern Alabama and (to a far lesser extent) northwestern Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia and southeastern Tennessee (U.S. state), Tennessee where the plateau is known as Raccoon Mountain Pumped-Storage Plant, Raccoon Mountain and Elder Mountain. It is part of the southern tip of the Appalachian Mountains, Appalachian mountain chain and it is the largest plateau in the chain. Geologically a continuation of Walden Ridge, Sand Mountain is part of the Cumberland Plateau, separated from the main portion of the plateau by the Tennessee River and Sequatchie Valley. The average elevation on Sand Mountain is around above sea level, compared to about in the surrounding area.Google Earth This elevation leads to its having the coolest climate in the state of Alabama. The largest city on Sand Mountain is Albertville, Alabama, Albertville, in Marshall County. As of the 2010 census, the population of the city was 21,160. History Prehistory through ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walden Ridge
Walden Ridge (or Walden's Ridge) is a mountain ridge and escarpment located in Tennessee, in the United States. It marks the eastern edge of the Cumberland Plateau and is generally considered part of it. Walden Ridge is about long, running generally north-south. Its highest point is at Hinch Mountain (near Crossville), which reaches above sea level. Sometimes Walden Ridge is called the Cumberland Escarpment. Geology Sequatchie Valley, a long valley in the Cumberland Plateau, is located just west of the southern part of Walden Ridge. Being part of the Cumberland Plateau, Walden Ridge is also part of the Appalachian Plateau physiographic province. The Sequatchie River runs through the valley. To the east of Walden Ridge are the Ridge-and-valley Appalachians and the Tennessee River. Walden Ridge is significantly higher than the Cumberland Plateau, and its eastern slope, descending over from the plateau to the Tennessee Valley, is steep and escarpment-like. Geologically, W ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nashville Basin
The Nashville Basin, also known as the Central Basin, is a term often used to describe the area surrounding Murfreesboro, Tennessee, in which Nashville is located. The Central Basin was caused by an uplifting which produced a dome known as the Nashville Dome. The Nashville Dome is evidenced by the underlying rock strata that all dip downwards away from Nashville. The uplifting of the Nashville Dome fractured overlying strata, making it more easily eroded and thus the "dome" resulted in a "basin". Uplifted strata in the center of a geological dome have higher potential erosive energy than the surrounding strata, because they are physically higher. Erosion thus acts on the uplifted area at a greater rate than on the surrounding flat-lying area, creating a low area, i.e. a basin. This area is more correctly referred to as the "Central Dome" of Tennessee. Nashville is located in the northwestern portion of the Central Basin. The basin extends for approximately forty-five to sixty m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Highland Rim
The Highland Rim is a geographic term for the area in Tennessee surrounding the Central Basin. Nashville is largely surrounded by higher terrain in all directions. Geologically, the Central Basin is a dome. The Highland Rim is a cuesta surrounding the basin, and the border where the difference in elevation is sharply pronounced is an escarpment. Nashville is located in the northwestern corner of the basin. Geology and Physiography The Highland Rim is a physiographic section of the larger Interior Low Plateaus province, which in turn is part of the larger Interior Plains physiographic division. Most of the Highland Rim is located in U.S. EPA Ecoregion 71, Interior Plateau, which is a part of the Eastern Temperate Forest. The sections of the Highland Rim are referred to the four cardinal directions, e.g., "Northern Highland Rim", etc. The Highland Rim is rather continuous and any division of it, including the ones made below, are somewhat arbitrary. The term "highland" here is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Waterfall
A waterfall is a point in a river or stream where water flows over a vertical drop or a series of steep drops. Waterfalls also occur where meltwater drops over the edge of a tabular iceberg or ice shelf. Waterfalls can be formed in several ways, but the most common method of formation is that a river courses over a top layer of resistant bedrock before falling on to softer rock, which Erosion, erodes faster, leading to an increasingly high fall. Waterfalls have been studied for their impact on species living in and around them. Humans have had a distinct relationship with waterfalls for years, travelling to see them, exploring and naming them. They can present formidable barriers to navigation along rivers. Waterfalls are religious sites in many cultures. Since the 18th century they have received increased attention as tourist destinations, sources of hydropower, andparticularly since the mid-20th centuryas subjects of research. Definition and terminology A waterfall is gen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Natural Arch
A natural arch, natural bridge, or (less commonly) rock arch is a natural landform where an arch has formed with an opening underneath. Natural arches commonly form where inland cliffs, coastal cliffs, fins or stacks are subject to erosion from the sea, rivers or weathering ( subaerial processes). Most natural arches are formed from narrow fins and sea stacks composed of sandstone or limestone with steep, often vertical, cliff faces. The formations become narrower due to erosion over geologic time scales. The softer rock stratum erodes away creating rock shelters, or alcoves, on opposite sides of the formation beneath the relatively harder stratum, or caprock, above it. The alcoves erode further into the formation eventually meeting underneath the harder caprock layer, thus creating an arch. The erosional processes exploit weaknesses in the softer rock layers making cracks larger and removing material more quickly than the caprock; however, the caprock itself continues to er ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rock Shelter
A rock shelter (also rockhouse, crepuscular cave, bluff shelter, or abri) is a shallow cave-like opening at the base of a bluff or cliff. In contrast to solutional caves (karst), which are often many miles long, rock shelters are almost always modest in size and extent. Formation Rock shelters form because a rock stratum such as sandstone that is resistant to erosion and weathering has formed a cliff or bluff, but a softer stratum, more subject to erosion and weathering, lies just below the resistant stratum, and thus undercuts the cliff. In arid areas, wind erosion (Aeolian erosion) can be an important factor in rockhouse formation. In most humid areas, the most important factor in rockhouse formation is frost spalling, where the softer, more porous rock underneath is pushed off, tiny pieces at a time, by frost expansion from water frozen in the pores. Erosion from moving water is seldom a significant factor. Many rock shelters are found under waterfalls. File:Rock shelt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canyon
A canyon (from ; archaic British English spelling: ''cañon''), or gorge, is a deep cleft between escarpments or cliffs resulting from weathering and the erosion, erosive activity of a river over geologic time scales. Rivers have a natural tendency to cut through underlying surfaces, eventually wearing away rock layers as sediments are removed downstream. A river bed will gradually reach a baseline elevation, which is the same elevation as the body of water into which the river drains. The processes of weathering and erosion will form canyons when the river's River source, headwaters and estuary are at significantly different elevations, particularly through regions where softer rock layers are intermingled with harder layers more resistant to weathering. A canyon may also refer to a rift between two mountain peaks, such as those in ranges including the Rocky Mountains, the Alps, the Himalayas or the Andes. Usually, a river or stream carves out such splits between mountains. Examp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
