North Central Plains Physical Features

Geographical Features of Texas

Geography of Texas

Region	South Central United states of america
Coordinates	31°N 100°Due west / 31°Northward 100°W / 31; -100 Coordinates: 31°Northward 100°W / 31°Due north 100°West / 31; -100
Area
• Total	268,581 sq mi (695,620 km²)
Coastline	367 mi (591 km)
Highest point	Guadalupe Superlative, eight,749 feet (ii,667 m)
Lowest point	Gulf of Mexico, sea level

The geography of Texas is diverse and big. Occupying about seven% of the total water and land area of the U.S.,^[1] information technology is the 2nd largest state afterward Alaska, and is the southernmost office of the Great Plains, which terminate in the south against the folded Sierra Madre Oriental of Mexico. Texas is in the S Central United states of america of America, and is considered to form role of the U.S. South and too part of the U.Due south. Southwest.^[2]

By residents, the land is more often than not divided into N Texas, East Texas, Cardinal Texas, South Texas, West Texas and, sometimes, the Panhandle, but co-ordinate to the Texas Almanac, Texas has iv major physical regions: Gulf Littoral Plains, Interior Lowlands, Great Plains, and Basin and Range Province. This has been cited as the difference between homo geography and physical geography, although the fact that Texas was granted the prerogative to divide into as many as five U.S. states may be a historical motive for Texans defining their state as containing exactly five regions.^[3]

Some regions in Texas are more associated with the American Southeast (primarily East Texas, Central Texas, and North Texas), while the Panhandle is considered past many to take more than in mutual with parts of the plains Midwest than either the South or Southwest. Geographically and culturally, El Paso is closer to New Mexico or Arizona than it is to Austin or to East Texas. The size of Texas prohibits easy categorization of the entire state wholly in any recognized region of the Us, and even cultural variety amidst regions of the country makes it difficult to treat Texas equally a region in its own right.

Physical geography [edit]

Texas covers a full area of 268,581 square miles (695,622 km^two). The longest directly-line distance is from the northwest corner of the panhandle to the Rio Grande river only below Brownsville, 801 miles (1,289 km).^[one] The greatest eastward–west distance is 773 miles (ane,244 km) from the farthermost due east bend in the Sabine River in Newton County to the extreme western bulge of the Rio Grande just above El Paso.^[4] The largest continental country is and so expansive that El Paso, in the western corner of the state, is closer to San Diego, California, than to the Houston/Beaumont area, near the Louisiana state line; while Orange, on the border with Louisiana, is closer to Jacksonville, Florida, than information technology is to El Paso. Texarkana, in the northeastern corner of the land, is near the aforementioned distance from Chicago, Illinois, as it is from El Paso, and Dalhart, in the northwestern corner of the state, is closer to the country capitals of Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, New United mexican states, Oklahoma and Wyoming than it is to Austin, its own state capital.^[5]

The geographic center of Texas is about xv miles (24 km) northeast of Brady in northern McCulloch County. Guadalupe Superlative, at 8,749 anxiety (2,666.seven m) above sea level, is the highest point in Texas, the lowest being sea level where Texas meets the Gulf of Mexico.^{[half dozen]} Texas has five land forests and 120 state parks totalling over 605,000 acres (two,450 km²).^[7] In that location are 3,700 named streams and xv major river systems flowing through 191,000 miles (307,000 km) of Texas, supporting over 212 reservoirs.^[8]

With 10 climatic regions, fourteen soil regions, and xi distinct ecological regions, regional classification becomes problematic with differences in soils, topography, geology, rainfall, and plant and creature communities.^[9]

Coast and estuaries [edit]

Much of the 367-mile (591 km) Gulf coastline of Texas is paralleled by the Texas barrier islands, many of which enclose a serial of estuaries where the state'due south rivers mix with h2o from the Gulf of Mexico. These water bodies include some of the largest and virtually ecologically productive coastal estuaries in the Us and contribute significantly to the ecological and economic resources of Texas.^[10]

Littoral Plains [edit]

The Gulf Coastal Plains extends from the Gulf of Mexico inland to the Balcones Fault and the Eastern Cantankerous Timbers. This large area stretches from the cities of Paris to San Antonio to Del Rio but shows a large diversity in vegetation. Ranging from xx to 58 inches (510 to one,470 mm) of annual rainfall, this is a almost level, drained obviously dissected by streams and rivers flowing into coastal estuaries and marshes. Windblown sands and dunes, grasslands, oak mottes and common salt marshes make up the seaward areas.^[eleven] National Parks include Large Thicket National Preserve, Padre Island National Seashore and the Palo Alto Battleground National Historic Site.^[12]

North Fundamental Plains [edit]

Looking north at the Caprock Escarpment.

The North Key Plains are divisional by the Caprock Escarpment to the due west, the Edwards Plateau to the south, and the Eastern Cross Timbers to the east. This surface area includes the North Fundamental Plains effectually the cities of Abilene and Wichita Falls, the Western Cross Timbers to the west of Fort Worth, the Thousand Prairie, and the Eastern Cross Timbers to the east of Dallas. With about 35 to 50 inches (890 to 1,270 mm) annual rainfall, gently rolling to hilly forested land is part of a larger pine-hardwood forest of oaks, hickories, elm and gum trees.^[11] Soils vary from coarse sands to tight clays or shet stone clays and shales.^[xiii]

Great Plains [edit]

The Smashing Plains include the Llano Estacado, the Panhandle, Edwards Plateau, Toyah Basin, and the Llano Uplift. It is bordered on the east past the Caprock Escarpment in the panhandle and by the Balcones Error to the southeast. Cities in this region include Midland and Odessa, Lubbock, and Amarillo. The Colina Country is a popular proper name for the area of hills forth the Balcones Escarpment and is a transitional area between the Great Plains and the Gulf Littoral Plains. With about xv to 31 inches (380 to 790 mm) annual rainfall, the southern terminate of the Great Plains are gently rolling plains of shrub and grassland, and home to the dramatic Caprock Canyons and Palo Duro Canyon country parks.^[11] The largest concentration of playa lakes in the world (nearly 22,000) is on the Southern High Plains of Texas and Eastern New Mexico.

Texas's blackland prairies were some of the get-go areas farmed in Texas. Highly expansive clays with characteristic dark coloration, called the Houston Black serial, occur on well-nigh ane.5 meg acres (vi,000 km²) extending from north of Dallas s to San Antonio. The Professional Soil Scientists Association of Texas has recommended to the State Legislature that the Houston Black serial be designated the State soil. The series was established in 1902.^[fourteen] National Parks in this expanse are the Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park and the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park.^[12]

Mountains and basins [edit]

The Trans-Pecos Natural Region has less than 12 inches (300 mm) annual rainfall. The near circuitous Natural Region, it includes Sand Hills, the Stockton Plateau, desert valleys, wooded mount slopes and desert grasslands. The Basin and Range Province is in West Texas, westward of the Pecos River, beginning with the Davis Mountains on the east and the Rio Grande to its w and southward. The Trans-Pecos region is the only part of Texas regarded as mountainous and includes seven named peaks in superlative greater than 8,000 feet (2,400 m). This region includes sand hills, desert valleys, wooded mountain slopes and desert grasslands.^[11] The vegetation diversity includes at least 268 grass species and 447 species of woody plants.^[xv] National Parks include the Amistad National Recreation Area, Big Curve National Park, Chamizal National Memorial, Fort Davis National Historic Site, Guadalupe Mountains National Park, and the Rio Grande Wild and Breathtaking River.^[12] This area is role of the Chihuahuan Desert.

Climate [edit]

Continental, Mountain, and Modified Marine are the three major climatic types of Texas, with no distinguishable boundaries. Modified Marine, or subtropical, dominates the majority of the land.^[16] Texas has an annual atmospheric precipitation range from 60.57 inches (1,538 mm) in Jasper Canton, East Texas, to 9.43 inches (240 mm) in El Paso. The record loftier of 120 °F (49 °C) was reached at Seymour on 12 August 1936, and Monahans on 28 June 1994. The low also ties at −23 °F (−31 °C) in Tulia on 12 February 1899, and Seminole on 8 February 1933.^[17]

Geology [edit]

Texas is mostly sedimentary rocks, with East Texas underlain past a Cretaceous and younger sequence of sediments, the trace of ancient shorelines east and south until the active continental margin of the Gulf of Mexico is met.^{[ citation needed ]} This sequence is congenital atop the subsided crest of the Appalachian Mountains–Ouachita Mountains–Marathon Mountains zone of Pennsylvanian continental collision, which complanate when rifting in Jurassic fourth dimension opened the Gulf of United mexican states. West from this orogenic crest, which is buried beneath the Dallas–Waco–Austin–San Antonio trend, the sediments are Permian and Triassic in historic period. Oil is found in the Cretaceous sediments in the east, the Permian sediments in the west, and forth the Gulf declension and out on the Texas continental shelf. A few exposures of Precambrian igneous and metamorphic rocks are establish in the fundamental and western parts of the state, and Oligocene volcanic rocks are found in far west Texas, in the Large Bend area. A blanket of Miocene sediments known equally the Ogallala formation in the western loftier plains region is an of import aquifer. Texas has no agile or fallow volcanoes and few earthquakes, existence situated far from an active plate tectonic boundary. The Large Curve area is the nigh seismically agile; however, the expanse is sparsely populated and suffers minimal damages and injuries, and no known fatalities have been attributed to a Texas convulsion.

Resources [edit]

With a big supply of natural resources, Texas is a major agricultural and industrial country, producing oil, cattle, sheep, and cotton fiber. The state also produces poultry, eggs, dairy products, greenhouse and plant nursery products, wheat, hay, rice, sugar cane, and peanuts, and a range of fruits and vegetables.^[18]

Asphalt-begetting rocks, mainly cretaceous limestones, occur in Bexar, Burnet, Kinney, Uvalde, and other counties.
Cement is produced in Bexar, Comal, Dallas, Ector, Ellis, El Paso, Harris, Hays, McLennan, Nolan, Nueces, Potter, and Tarrant counties. Historically, Texas' Portland cement output accounts for about ten% of the almanac United States production.^{[ citation needed ]}
With an affluence of various types of clays, Texas is 1 of the leading producers of clays.
Bituminous coal occurs primarily in Coleman, Eastland, Erath, Jack, McCulloch, Montague, Palo Pinto, Parker, Throckmorton, Wise, and Young counties of Texas. Lignite, or brown coal, occurs in deposits in the Texas Littoral Plain.
Fluorspar or fluorite is an of import industrial mineral used in the manufacture of steel, aluminum, glass, and fluorocarbons. It occurs at several localities in the Trans-Pecos and Llano regions of Texas.
Collecting gemstone rock and mineral specimens has proved quite profitable. Agate, jasper, cinnabar, fluorite, topaz, calcite, opal, petrified wood, and tektites are all unremarkably nerveless.
Deposits of graphite occur in the Llano region and was previously produced in Burnet County.
Bat guano occurs in numerous caverns in the Edwards Plateau and in the Trans-Pecos region and to a more than limited extent in Central Texas.
Gypsum is extensively adult in Texas where the main occurrences are in the Permian Basin, the Cretaceous Edwards Formation in Gillespie and Menard counties, and the Gulf Coast salt domes of Harris Canton and previously Brooks County.
Texas is the leading producer of helium solely from the Cliffside gas field almost Amarillo.
Deposits of iron ore are present in northeastern Texas as well every bit several in Key Texas.
Elements of the Lanthanide serial are commonly termed rare-earth elements. Several of the rare earths have anomalous concentrations in the rhyolitic and related igneous rocks in the Trans-Pecos area of Texas. A eolith containing several rare-earth minerals was exposed at Barringer Hill in Llano County earlier it was covered past the waters of Lake Buchanan.
Limestones, arable in many parts of Texas, are used in the manufacture of lime. Plants for the production of lime are operating in Bexar, Bosque, Burnet, Comal, Deafened Smith, Hill, Johnson, Nueces, and Travis counties.
Magnesium chloride, magnesium sulfate and other mineral salts are present in the Upper Permian Basin and in the underlying playas of the High Plains.
Manganese is known to occur in Precambrian rocks in Mason and Llano counties, in Val Verde County, in Jeff Davis County, and in Dickens County.
Mica is present in Precambrian pegmatite in the Llano region.
Common opal occurs on the Texas Littoral Obviously.
Salts occurs in large quantities in salt domes in the Texas Coastal Plain and with other evaporites in the Permian Basin of West Texas, also as about 1000 Saline, Texas.
Sands used for industrial purposes commonly have been found in the Texas Coastal Plains, East Texas, northward primal Texas, and Central Texas; and sand mines accept opened in the Shinnery (dunes) ecosystem of northern West Texas and the eastern part of the W Wingtip.
The discovery of silverish in Texas has been credited by some to Franciscans who discovered and operated mines near El Paso nearly 1680. Documented silverish production started in the tardily 1880s at the Presidio Mine, in Presidio County. Texas produced 32,663,405 troy ounces of argent between 1885 and 1955.
Sulfur occurs in the caprocks of salt domes in the Gulf Coastal Plain, in Permian-historic period bedded deposits in Trans-Pecos Texas.
In the past, uranium was produced from surface mines in Atascosa, Gonzales, Karnes, and Alive Oak counties. All uranium mines are closed and Texas is no longer a producer.^[xix]
The Barnett Shale, located in the Fort Worth basin, has gained attention in recent years equally a source of natural gas. Controversy regarding drilling and exploration rights is an issue.

References [edit]

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^ ^a ^b ^c ^d "LoneStarInternet". Retrieved 2006-07-14 .
^ ^a ^b ^c "Tx Ecology Profiles". Retrieved 2006-07-fourteen .
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^ Garner, L. Edwin. "The Handbook of Texas online". Retrieved 2006-07-xi .