What causes physical features like mountains and valleys?

What causes physical features like mountains and valleys?

Tectonic plate movement under the Earth can create landforms by pushing up mountains and hills. Erosion by water and wind can wear down land and create landforms like valleys and canyons. Both processes happen over a long period of time, sometimes millions of years.

How mountains and valleys are formed?

Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams over a very long period of time. Some valleys are formed through erosion by glacial ice. These glaciers may remain present in valleys in high mountain or polar areas.

Where can mountains be found?

Many of earth’s mountain ranges are located along plate boundaries, or former plate boundaries. Spreading boundaries produce mountains along rifts like the East African Rift (Figure 6), and along mid-ocean ridges. Volcanoes and fault-block mountains are common along boundaries.

What is the purpose of mountains?

Mountains are particularly important for their biodiversity, water, clean air, research, cultural diversity, leisure, landscape and spiritual values.

Why are there mountains?

Most mountains formed from Earth’s tectonic plates smashing together. Below the ground, Earth’s crust is made up of multiple tectonic plates. They’ve been moving around since the beginning of time. And they still move today as a result of geologic activity below the surface.

What effect do mountains have on surrounding land?

What effect do mountains have on surrounding land? Mountains can affect the climate of nearby lands. In some areas, mountains block rain, so that one side of a mountain range may be rainy and the other side may be a desert. Rain Shadow. Much of airborne moisture falls as rain on the windward side of mountains.

What is the difference between Plateau and mountains?

Tourist centres: The pleasant climate and beautiful sceneries of the mountains have led to their development as centres of tourist attraction. A plateau is an elevated area with a more or less levelled land on its top. It has a large area on its top and a steep slope on its sides. They are also called as high plains or tablelands.

What is a valley in geography?

A valley is a lowland area or surface depression of the earth between higher lands such as mountains or hills. In simple terms, it can be defined as a natural trough bounded by mountains or hills on the surface of the earth sloping down to the lake, ocean or stream, which is created because of water or ice erosion.

What are the two main differences in climate of mountains?

The main differences in climate of mountains are temperature and moisture. What is the climate like on mountains? The temperature on mountains becomes colder the higher the altitude gets. Mountains tend to have much wetter climates than the surrounding flat land.