14 THE SOUTHERN APPALACHIAN FORESTS. 



This region includes the most prominent geographic features of the Southern 

 States, and has a very important influence on the climate and the water and 

 timber supply of all the territory between Ohio River and the Atlantic and Gulf 

 coasts. It is thus of economic interest to the population far beyond its borders. 



The region examined in 1900 and 1901 comprises an area of approximately 

 10,000 square miles between New River Gap in Virginia and Hiwassee River in 

 western North Carolina and northern Georgia, having an approximate length of 

 190 miles and a varying width of 35 to 65 miles. Of this area, 8,300 square 

 miles were examined with reference to the cleared and burned areas, the density 

 of the forest, and the timber resources. 



RELIEF. 



This is a mountainous region of considerable elevation. The Piedmont 

 Plateau has at its eastern base an elevation of 1,000 feet, and the Appalachian 

 Valley of Virginia and Tennessee at the northwest base has an elevation of 1,000 

 to 2,000 feet. 



The mountain peaks of this region are the highest in the United States east 

 of the Rocky Mountains. The highest is Mount Mitchell, which has an elevation 

 of 6,712 feet. Over 40 peaks and approximately 6,400 acres of land, distributed 

 along the Blue Ridge, the Unakas, and the intermediate highlands, have an 

 altitude of over 6,000 feet, and about 54,000 acres are above 5,000 feet. The 

 peaks are seldom precipitous, and their profiles, instead of being angular and 

 serrate, are rounded and softened by age. 



In the Unakas the summits are capped by hard quartzite, and the principal 

 topographic features between Nolichucky River and White Top Mountain, Vir- 

 ginia, are parallel northeast-southwest ridges. On the Blue Ridge, about High- 

 lands and Toxaway, ridges transverse to the general trend of the Blue Ridge 

 are carved from great masses of granite, whose bare and steep slopes add 

 variety to this portion of the region. In the upper Watauga and New River 

 basins the configuration of the interior mountains is that of a choppy sea, due 

 to the resistance ojffered to erosion of ledges of schist and gneiss, which cap the 

 summits. 



The present topography is the result of long-continued erosion. The harder 

 and more durable rocks remain on the tops of the mountains, while the softer 

 and less durable strata have been worn away. 



Prominent in the topography of this region are the gorges cut through the 

 mountain ranges by the streams. These are deepest near the foothills, where the 

 rivers pass the last mountain barriers. Deep gorges divide the Unaka Mountains 

 into several segments. The most notable of these gorges are on New River above 

 Ivanhoe, Va. ; on Laurel Fork of the South Fork of Holston River near Damascus, 



