Folders: ROOT > ScienceBase Catalog > Spatial Feature Registry > Omernik Level III Ecoregions for the US (including Alaska) for use as a reference data collection ( Show direct descendants )
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ROOT _ScienceBase Catalog __Spatial Feature Registry ___Omernik Level III Ecoregions for the US (including Alaska) for use as a reference data collection Filters
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This ecoregion consists of a wide swath of rolling hills and plateaus that grades from the coastal plain (101) on the north to the Brooks Range (103) on the south. The east-west extent of the ecoregion stretches from the international boundary between Alaska and the Yukon Territory, Canada, to the Chukchi Sea. The hills and valleys of the region have better defined drainage patterns than those found in the coastal plain to the north and have fewer lakes. The area is underlain by thick permafrost and many ice-related surface features are present. The region is predominantly treeless and is vegetated primarily by mesic graminoid herbaceous communities.
The mountains of south central Alaska, the Alaska Range, are very high and steep. This ecoregion is covered by rocky slopes, icefields, and glaciers. Much of the area is barren of vegetation. Dwarf scrub communities are common at higher elevations and on windswept sites where vegetation does exist. The Alaska Range has a continental climatic regime, but because of the extreme height of many of the ridges and peaks, annual precipitation at higher elevations is similar to that measured for some ecoregions having maritime climate.
This ecoregion is composed of rounded, folded and faulted sedimentary ridges intermittently surmounted by volcanoes. The mountains were heavily glaciated during the Pleistocene epoch. A marine climate prevails, and the region is generally free of permafrost. Many soils formed in deposits of volcanic ash and cinder over glacial deposits and are highly erodible. Vegetation cover commonly consists of dwarf scrub communities at higher elevations and on sites exposed to wind, and low scrub communities at lower elevations and in more protected sites.
The Interior River Lowland is made up of many wide, flat-bottomed terraced valleys, forested valley slopes, and dissected glacial till plains. In contrast to the generally rolling to slightly irregular plains in adjacent ecological regions to the north (54), east (55) and west (40, 47), where most of the land is cultivated for corn and soybeans, a little less than half of this area is in cropland, about 30 percent is in pasture, and the remainder is in forest. Bottomland deciduous forests and swamp forests were common on wet lowland sites, with mixed oak and oak-hickory forests on uplands. Paleozoic sedimentary rock is typical and coal mining occurs in several areas.
Similar to the Northeastern Highlands (58), the Northeastern Coastal Zone contains relatively nutrient poor soils and concentrations of continental glacial lakes, some of which are sensitive to acidification; however, this ecoregion contains considerably less surface irregularity and much greater concentrations of human population. Landforms in the region include irregular plains, and plains with high hills. Appalachian oak forests and northeastern oak-pine forests are the natural vegetation types. Although attempts were made to farm much of the Northeastern Coastal Zone after the region was settled by Europeans, land use now mainly consists of forests, woodlands, and urban and suburban development, with only some...
Stretching from Kentucky to Alabama, these open low mountains contain a mosaic of forest and woodland with some cropland and pasture. The eastern boundary of the ecoregion, along the more abrupt escarpment where it meets the Ridge and Valley (67), is relatively smooth and only slightly notched by small, eastward flowing streams. Much of the western boundary, next to the Interior Plateau (71), is more crenulated, with a rougher escarpment that is more deeply incised. The mixed mesophytic forest is restricted mostly to the deeper ravines and escarpment slopes, and the upland forests are dominated by mixed oaks with shortleaf pine. Ecoregion 68 has less agriculture than the adjacent Ecoregion 71. Coal mining occurs...
This physically and biologically diverse ecoregion covers the highly dissected ridges, foothills, and valleys of the Klamath and Siskiyou mountains. It also extends south in California to include the mixed conifer and montane hardwood forests that occur
The Northern Basin and Range consists of dissected lava plains, rocky uplands, valleys, alluvial fans, and scattered mountain ranges. Overall, it is cooler and has more available moisture than the Central Basin and Range (13) to the south. Ecoregion 80 is higher and cooler than the Snake River Plain (12) to the northeast in Idaho. Valleys support sagebrush steppe or saltbush vegetation. Cool season grasses, such as Idaho fescue and bluebunch wheatgrass are more common than in Ecoregion 13 to the south. Mollisols are also more common than in the hotter and drier basins of the Central Basin and Range (13) where Aridisols support sagebrush, shadscale, and greasewood. Juniper woodlands occur on rugged, stony uplands....
This mostly forested region, with dense concentrations of continental glacial lakes, is less rugged than the Northeastern Highlands (58) to the west and considerably less populated than Ecoregion 59 to the south. Vegetation here is mostly spruce-fir on the lowlands with some patches of maple, beech, and birch on the hills. Soils are predominantly frigid Spodosols. By contrast, the forests in the Northeastern Coastal Zone (59) to the south are mostly Appalacian oak or northeastern oak-pine and the soils are generally mesic Inceptisols and Entisols.
Similar to other ecoregions in central and southern California, the Southern California Mountains have a Mediterranean climate of hot dry summers and moist cool winters. Although Mediterranean types of vegetation such as chaparral and oak woodlands predominate in this region, the elevations are considerably higher, the summers are slightly cooler, and precipitation amounts are greater than in adjacent ecoregions, resulting in denser vegetation and some large areas of coniferous woodlands. In parts of the Transverse Range, a general slope effect causes distinct ecological differences. The south-facing slopes typically have higher precipitation (30-40 inches) compared to many of the north slopes of the range (15-20...
This ecoregion is composed of a core area of high, precipitous mountains with narrow crests and valleys flanked in some areas by dissected plateaus and open high mountains. The elevational banding pattern of vegetation is similar to that of the Southern Rockies (21) except that areas of aspen, interior chaparral, and juniper-pinyon and scrub oak are more common at middle elevations. This characteristic, along with a far lesser extent of lodgepole pine and greater use of the region for grazing livestock in the summer months, distinguish the Wasatch and Uinta Mountains ecoregion from the more northerly Middle Rockies (17).
This desert ecoregion extends from the Madrean Archipelago (79) in southeast Arizona to the Edwards Plateau (30) in south-central Texas. It is the northern portion of the southernmost desert in North America that extends more than 500 miles south into Mexico. It is generally a continuation of basin and range terrain that is typical of the Mojave Basin and Range (14) and Sonoran Basin and Range (81) ecoregions to the west, although the pattern of alternating mountains and valleys is not as pronounced. The mountain ranges are a geologic mix of Tertiary volcanic and intrusive granitic rocks, Paleozoic sedimentary layers, and some Precambrian granitic plutonic rocks. Outside the major river drainages, such as the Rio...
This mountainous ecoregion stretches from the central portion of western Washington, through the spine of Oregon, and includes a disjunct area in northern California. It is underlain by Cenozoic volcanics and much of the region has been affected by alpine glaciation. In Oregon and Washington, the western Cascades are older, lower, and dissected by numerous, steep-sided stream valleys. A high plateau occurs to the east, with both active and dormant volcanoes. Some peaks reach over 14,000 feet. Soils are mostly of cryic and frigid temperature regimes, with some mesic soils at low elevations and in the south. Andisols and Inceptisols are common. The Cascades have a moist, temperate climate that supports an extensive...
The Northern Rockies ecoregion is mountainous and rugged. Despite its inland position, both climate and vegetation are typically, but not always, marine-influenced. Douglas-fir, subalpine fir, Englemann spruce, and ponderosa pine and Pacific indicators such as western red cedar, western hemlock, and grand fir occur in the ecoregion. The vegetation mosaic is different from that of the Idaho Batholith (16) and Middle Rockies (17) which are not dominated by maritime species. The Northern Rockies ecoregion is not as high nor as extensively snow- and ice-covered as the Canadian Rockies (41), although alpine characteristics occur at highest elevations and include numerous glacial lakes. Granitic rocks and associated management...
This ecoregion is a dissected, partially glaciated, mountainous plateau. Many perennial streams originate here and water quality can be high if basins are undisturbed. Deeply weathered, acidic, intrusive igneous rock is common and is far more extensive than in the Northern Rockies (15) or the Middle Rockies (17). Soils are sensitive to disturbance especially when stabilizing vegetation is removed. Land uses include logging, grazing, and recreation. Mining and related damage to aquatic habitat was widespread. Grand fir, Douglas-fir, and, at higher elevations, Engelmann spruce and subalpine fir occur. Ponderosa pine, shrubs, and grasses grow in very deep canyons. Maritime influence lessens toward the south and is...
The Southern Rockies are composed of steep, rugged mountains with high elevations. Although coniferous forests cover much of the region, as in most of the mountainous regions in the western United States, vegetation, as well as soil and land use, follows a pattern of elevational banding. The lowest elevations are generally grass or shrub covered and heavily grazed. Low to middle elevations are also grazed and covered by a variety of vegetation types including Douglas-fir, ponderosa pine, aspen, and juniper-oak woodlands. Middle to high elevations are largely covered by coniferous forests and have little grazing activity. The highest elevations have alpine characteristics.
The Ouachita Mountains ecological region is made up of sharply defined east-west trending ridges, formed through erosion of compressed sedimentary rock formations. The Ouachitas are structurally different from the Boston Mountains (38), more folded and rugged than the lithologically distinct Ozark Highlands (39), and physiographically unlike the Arkansas Valley (37), South Central Plains (35), and Mississippi Alluvial Plain (73). Potential natural vegetation is oak-hickory-pine forest, which contrasts with the oak-hickory forest that dominates Ecoregion 39 and the northern part of the Boston Mountains (38). Most of this region is now in loblolly and shortleaf pine. Commercial logging is the major land use in the...
A region of mostly forested valleys and ridges, the physiography of the Arkansas Valley is much less irregular than that of the Boston Mountains (38) to the north and the Ouachita Mountains (36) to the south, but is more irregular than the ecological regions to the west and east. About one fourth of the region is grazed and roughly one tenth is cropland. In the Arkansas Valley, even streams that have been relatively unimpacted by human activities have considerably lower dissolved oxygen levels, and hence support different biological communities, than those of most of the adjacent regions.
This ecoregion stretches from near the Ohio River in western Kentucky to Louisiana. It consists primarily of irregular plains, some gently rolling hills, and near the Mississippi River, bluffs. Thick loess is one of the distinguishing characteristics. The bluff hills in the western portion contain soils that are deep, steep, silty, and erosive. Flatter topography is found to the east, and streams tend to have less gradient and more silty substrates than in the Southeastern Plains ecoregion (65). To the east, upland forests dominated by oak, hickory, and both loblolly and shortleaf pine, and to the west on bluffs some mixed and southern mesophytic forests, were the dominant natural vegetation. Agriculture is now...
The Eastern Cascade Slopes and Foothills ecoregion is in the rainshadow of the Cascade Range (4). It has a more continental climate than ecoregions to the west, with greater temperature extremes and less precipitation. Open forests of ponderosa pine and some lodgepole pine distinguish this region from the higher ecoregions to the west where hemlock and fir forests are common, and the lower, drier ecoregions to the east where shrubs and grasslands are predominant. The vegetation is adapted to the prevailing dry, continental climate and frequent fire. Historically, creeping ground fires consumed accumulated fuel and devastating crown fires were less common in dry forests. Volcanic cones and buttes are common in much...
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