Geology of the Appalachian Mountains

The Appalachians are among the oldest mountains on Earth, born of powerful upheavals within the terrestrial crust and sculpted by the ceaseless action of water upon the surface. The two types of rock that characterize the present Appalachian ranges tell much of the story of the mountains’ long existence.

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First there are the most ancient crystalline rocks. Between about 1.1 billion and 541 million years ago, during the Precambrian era, long periods of sedimentation and violent eruptions alternated to create rocks and then subject them to such extreme heat and pressure that they were changed into sequences of metamorphic rocks. Among the oldest of these are the gneisses. Limestone changed into marble, shales became slate and schist, sandstones were transformed into quartzite, and intrusions of magma formed bodies of granite. These ancient rocks antedated most plant or animal life; in addition, the intense pressure and heat destroyed any traces of primitive life—so that the Precambrian crystallines contain no trace of fossils. They make up what is known as “Old” Appalachia in Canada, New England, and a belt east of the Great Valley with the Blue Ridge at its heart.

To the west the Great Valley, the Valley Ridges, and the Appalachian Plateau (including the Alleghenies) are characterized by the second type of rocks, sediments of Paleozoic age (i.e., about 252 to 541 million years old). These make up “New” Appalachia—the shales, sandstones, limestones, and coals that were formed as sediments were deposited, stratified, and solidified over geologic time. During the Carboniferous Period (358.9 to 298.9 million years ago), this long process included the formation of some of the richest coal beds in the world. During the Permian Period (298.9 to 252.2 million years ago), a great mountain folding occurred. This was the Appalachian Revolution, a vast interior crumpling resulting from the stress placed on huge masses of subterranean rock. As parts of the Earth buckled into folds, cracked, and faulted, other parts were uplifted—sometimes in the parallel ridges distinctive of the Appalachians—and thrust faults served to move one rock mass atop another. Thus, the ancient crystallines were lifted in places above the more recent sedimentary rock deposits.

In addition to the massive folding of the Alleghenian orogeny (Appalachian Revolution), however, two other agents—ice and water—have carved the steep ridges and pinnacles and gouged out the deep ravines and valleys of the Appalachians. This building, eroding, uplifting, and shaping of the Appalachians has been a continuous process throughout the ages. Many of the major rivers are older than the mountains. This accounts for the fact that northeast of the New River in Virginia the major Appalachian rivers flow into the Atlantic Ocean, often through dramatic passages called water gaps, while southwest of the New the rivers, with few exceptions, flow to the Ohio River. When the mountains were thrust up, blocking their westward course to the ancient sea that once covered the American Midwest, these old rivers cut out their own routes, creating those spectacular canyons, gorges, and “narrows” that are part of Appalachian scenery.

The northern Appalachians were also affected by glacial forces. During the Pleistocene Epoch (about 2,588,000 to 11,700 years ago), continental ice sheets flowed down over North America, covering New England but reaching no nearer the southern Appalachians than the Ohio River valley. These moving tongues of ice stripped topsoil, ground and polished certain peaks, and elsewhere scattered rock debris and random boulders, all the while driving plants and animals farther south where they could survive. Thus, the southern Appalachians became the refuge for northern life forms, a giant bed for reseeding when the glaciers retreated and the plants moved slowly north again, leaving behind a rich botanical variety thriving in northern and southern latitudes. Even today, many “northern” plant species are found in the higher elevations of the Great Smoky Mountains, where the cooler temperatures and relative isolation provide them refuge.

Drainage

The New River, rising on the Blue Ridge in North Carolina, runs northward and then turns westward across the Appalachian Valley and the Alleghenies (where it becomes the Kanawha River) and empties into the Mississippi River basin. The larger mountain streams to the south, dominated by the Tennessee River, follow this example. Exceptions are the rivers rising southeastward on the Blue Ridge, which flow into the Atlantic, and the Chattahoochee, rising in the northeastern corner of Georgia, which runs southwestward into the Gulf of Mexico.

The entire Appalachian system is laced with an intricate network of springs, streams, waterfalls, and rivers. Water is most abundant in the southern Appalachians. Certain areas of the Blue Ridge receive an annual rainfall of about 70 inches (1,775 mm) during an average year. Elsewhere precipitation is even higher—the western slopes of the Great Smoky Mountains, for example, often receive as much as 90 inches per year—being exceeded in the United States only along the northwest Pacific coast. Much of this rainfall comes in extremely heavy downpours during short periods. Since this region does not have the natural storehouses of numerous lakes and glacial deposits of sand and gravel spread over hills and valleys, such as are found in the northern Appalachian region, sudden rainfalls bring rapid rises in the southern Appalachian stream flows. Under certain conditions (such as when the forest cover, which serves as a biotic buffer, has been destroyed) destructive floods and debris flows characterize much of the hydrologic history of this part of the Appalachians. Geologic evidence of past floods, landslides, and mudflows abounds, especially in the middle and southern Appalachians. There, lobes of rock, soil, and debris choke the lower reaches of many small stream valleys. Recent studies suggest that many of these ancient debris flows were initiated by hurricanes and their heavy rainfall. To contain these floods and harness the might of an entire river system for purposes of navigation, power production, land reclamation, and watershed development, the Tennessee Valley Authority was established in 1933, and it quickly became one of the chief factors influencing the ecology of the Southern Appalachian region. Its system of dams turned a river that rampaged and often destroyed into a river that flows gently and productively. The TVA created a series of spacious reservoirs (the majority of which are in or adjoining the Appalachian region) called “the Great Lakes of the South.” These lakes, in turn, have altered the natural and human resources of the region, using Appalachian water power to produce electrical power that has expanded industrial and agricultural and recreational opportunities.

Waterfalls are common throughout much of the Appalachian system. Most of those in the northern Appalachians, especially from New York to Maine, were created when glacial moraine or debris, scraped from surrounding peaks by the melting ice cap, solidified into shelves along creeks or river valleys over which the water must plunge as over a terrace. Southern Appalachian waterfalls generally were formed by the action of water on alternating layers of soft and hard rock.

Climate

Generally temperate and humid, the climate of the Appalachians presents sharp contrasts. In the Canadian ranges and the Presidential Range of the White Mountains, Arctic and subarctic conditions prevail. Elevations below 2,000 feet usually have milder weather in the hills of northwestern Georgia and northeastern and north-central Alabama. Snowfall is heaviest in the Shickshocks, Newfoundland’s Long Range, and the White Mountains, but Mount Mitchell in North Carolina has recorded more than 100 inches in a single year. Unique in climatic severity is barren, boulder-strewn Mount Washington, which is lashed by some of the world’s strongest winds (a gust of 231 miles per hour was recorded there in 1934); temperatures recorded on its summit have never risen above 71 °F (22 °C). Heavy clouds and haze are common throughout the Appalachians, often frustrating recreational activities and sightseeing but nourishing the abundant plant life and the river system.