In geology and physical geography , a plateau ( / p l ə ˈ t oʊ , p l æ ˈ t oʊ , ˈ p l æ t oʊ / ; French: [plato] ; pl. : plateaus or plateaux ), also called a high plain or a tableland , is an area of a highland consisting of flat terrain that is raised sharply above the surrounding area on at least one side. Often one or more sides have deep hills or escarpments . Plateaus can be formed by a number of processes, including upwelling of volcanic magma , extrusion of lava , and erosion by water and glaciers . Plateaus are classified according to their surrounding environment as intermontane, piedmont, or continental. A few plateaus may have a small flat top while others have wider ones.
29-898: Wood Mountain Hills are a hilly plateau in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan . The hills are located in the southern part of the province and are part of the Missouri Coteau , which is part of the Laurentian Divide between the watersheds of the Hudson Bay drainage basin of the Arctic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico of the Atlantic Ocean . The hills are in a semi-arid region known as Palliser's Triangle in
58-449: A viscous fluid . Partial melting of the mantle at mid-ocean ridges produces oceanic crust , and partial melting of the mantle at subduction zones produces continental crust . Mercury has a silicate mantle approximately 490 kilometers (300 miles) thick, constituting only 28% of its mass. Venus 's silicate mantle is approximately 2,800 kilometers (1,700 miles) thick, constituting around 70% of its mass. Mars 's silicate mantle
87-553: A river was already there, though not necessarily on exactly the same course. Then, subterranean geological forces caused the land in that part of North America to gradually rise by about a centimeter per year for millions of years. An unusual balance occurred: the river that would become the Colorado River was able to erode into the crust of the Earth at a nearly equal rate to the uplift of the plateau. Now, millions of years later,
116-463: Is approximately 1,600 kilometers (990 miles) thick, constituting ~74–88% of its mass, and may be represented by chassignite meteorites. Uranus and Neptune 's ice mantles are approximately 30,000 km thick, composing 80% of both masses. Jupiter 's moons Io , Europa , and Ganymede have silicate mantles; Io's ~1,100 kilometers (680 miles) silicate mantle is overlain by a volcanic crust, Ganymede's ~1,315 kilometers (817 miles) thick silicate mantle
145-622: Is divided into three main flat regions: the Bogotá savanna , the valleys of Ubaté and Chiquinquirá , and the valleys of Duitama and Sogamoso . The parallel Sierra of Andes delimit one of the world highest plateaux: the Altiplano , (Spanish for "high plain"), Andean Plateau or Bolivian Plateau. It lies in west-central South America, where the Andes are at their widest, is the most extensive area of high plateau on Earth outside of Tibet. The bulk of
174-597: Is overlain by ~835 kilometers (519 miles) of ice, and Europa's ~1,165 kilometers (724 miles) km silicate mantle is overlain by ~85 kilometers (53 miles) of ice and possibly liquid water. The silicate mantle of the Earth's moon is approximately 1300–1400 km thick, and is the source of mare basalts . The lunar mantle might be exposed in the South Pole-Aitken basin or the Crisium basin . The lunar mantle contains
203-710: Is sometimes called the Roof of Africa due to its height and large area. Another example is the Highveld which is the portion of the South African inland plateau which has an altitude above approximately 1,500 metres, but below 2,100 metres, thus excluding the Lesotho mountain regions. It is home to some of the largest South African urban agglomerations . In Egypt are the Giza Plateau and Galala Mountain , which
232-545: Is the Scottish Highlands . Plateaus are classified according to their surrounding environment. The highest African plateau is the Ethiopian Highlands which cover the central part of Ethiopia. It forms the largest continuous area of its altitude in the continent, with little of its surface falling below 1,500 metres (4,921 ft), while the summits reach heights of up to 4,550 metres (14,928 ft). It
261-572: Is the home of more than 70 million people. The Western Plateau , part of the Australian Shield , is an ancient craton covering much of the continent's southwest, an area of some 700,000 square kilometres. It has an average elevation between 305 and 460 metres. The North Island Volcanic Plateau is an area of high land occupying much of the centre of the North Island of New Zealand, with volcanoes, lava plateaus, and crater lakes,
290-895: The Deccan Plateau (≈1,900,000 km (730,000 sq mi), elevation 300–600 metres (980–1,970 ft)). A large plateau in North America is the Colorado Plateau , which covers about 337,000 km (130,000 sq mi) in Colorado , Arizona , New Mexico , and Utah . In northern Arizona and southern Utah the Colorado Plateau is bisected by the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon . This came to be over 10 million years ago,
319-586: The Deccan Plateau in India and the Meseta Central on the Iberian Peninsula . Plateaus can also be formed by the erosional processes of glaciers on mountain ranges, leaving them sitting between the mountain ranges. Water can also erode mountains and other landforms down into plateaus. Dissected plateaus are highly eroded plateaus cut by rivers and broken by deep narrow valleys. An example
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#1732773193340348-819: The Great Plains ecoregion of North America. The Wood Mountain Hills are known locally as "the Bench" and, at a height of 1,013 metres (3,323 ft) above sea level, are the second highest point of land in Western Canada east of the Rocky Mountains . The highest point is just to the west in the neighbouring Cypress Hills . The south-eastern part of the Wood Mountain Hills was one of the few places in Canada that wasn't covered in ice during
377-504: The Last Glacial Period . This preserved tertiary sands and gravels at higher the elevations while other parts of the hills have glacial drift and deep-cut valleys and coulees carved by glacial meltwaters that are separated by flat-topped buttes . The Rock Creek Badlands, also called Killdeer Badlands , were formed by these melting glaciers. The badlands run along the southern slopes of the plateau. The highest point of
406-436: The giant planets , specifically ice giants , a number of asteroids , and some planetary moons have mantles. The Earth's mantle is a layer of silicate rock between the crust and the outer core . Its mass of 4.01 × 10 kg is 67% the mass of the Earth. It has a thickness of 2,900 kilometres (1,800 mi) making up about 84% of Earth's volume. It is predominantly solid, but in geological time it behaves as
435-408: The mantle , causing the ground to swell upward. In this way, large, flat areas of rock are uplifted to form a plateau. For plateaus formed by extrusion, the rock is built up from lava spreading outward from cracks and weak areas in the crust. Tectonic plateaus are formed by tectonic plate movements which cause uplift, and are normally of a considerable size, and a fairly uniform altitude. Examples are
464-567: The " Roof of the World ", which is still being formed by the collisions of the Indo-Australian and Eurasian tectonic plates . The Tibetan Plateau covers approximately 2,500,000 km (970,000 sq mi), at about 5,000 m (16,000 ft) above sea level. The plateau is sufficiently high to reverse the Hadley cell convection cycles and to drive the monsoons of India towards
493-688: The Altiplano lies within Bolivian and Peruvian territory while its southern parts lie in Chile. The Altiplano plateau hosts several cities like Puno, Oruro, El Alto and La Paz the administrative seat of Bolivia. Northeastern Altiplano is more humid than the Southwestern, the latter of which hosts several salares , or salt flats, due to its aridity. At the Bolivia-Peru border lies Lake Titicaca ,
522-721: The North Rim of the Grand Canyon is at an elevation of about 2,450 m (8,040 ft) above sea level , and the South Rim of the Grand Canyon is about 2,150 m (7,050 ft) above sea level. At its deepest, the Colorado River is about 1,830 m (6,000 ft) below the level of the North Rim. Another high-altitude plateau in North America is the Mexican Plateau . With an area of 601,882 km (232,388 sq mi) and average height of 1,825 metres, it
551-509: The Wood Mountain Hills. Plateau Plateaus can be formed by a number of processes, including upwelling of volcanic magma, extrusion of lava, plate tectonics movements, and erosion by water and glaciers. Volcanic plateaus are produced by volcanic activity . The Columbia Plateau in the north-western United States is an example. They may be formed by upwelling of volcanic magma or extrusion of lava. The underlining mechanism in forming plateaus from upwelling starts when magma rises from
580-625: The bottom of coulees and alongside streams, trees and shrubs, such as aspen , green ash , wolf willow , and buffalo berry , grow. In drier locations, plants such as sage, rabbitbrush , greasewood , mosses, lichens, and cacti can be found. Throughout the hills and in the East Block of Grasslands National Park , wildlife such as bats, black-tailed prairie dogs , swift foxes , burrowing owls, greater sage-grouses, eastern yellow-bellied racers, and greater short-horned lizards can be found. There are several Saskatchewan parks located throughout
609-674: The gods" in the native tongue of the Pemon , the Indigenous people who inhabit the Gran Sabana . Tepuis can be considered minute plateaus and tend to be found as isolated entities rather than in connected ranges, which makes them the host of a unique array of endemic plant and animal species. Some of the most outstanding tepuis are Neblina , Autana , Auyan and Mount Roraima . They are typically composed of sheer blocks of Precambrian quartz arenite sandstone that rise abruptly from
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#1732773193340638-458: The hills include Frenchman River , Denniel Creek, Breed Creek, Little Breed Creek, Otter Creek, Bluff Creek, McEachern Creek, West Poplar River, Poplar River , East Poplar River, Weatherall Creek, Rock Creek, and Johnson Creek. The Wood Mountain Hills are mostly covered in grasses and are in the mixed-grass prairie ecozone of Canada . Common grasses include spear grass, wheatgrass , and blue grama grass . In areas with more moisture, such as at
667-492: The jungle, giving rise to spectacular natural scenery. Auyán-tepui is the source of Angel Falls , the world's tallest waterfall . The Colombian capital city of Bogota sits on an Andean plateau known as the Altiplano Cundiboyacense roughly the size of Switzerland. Averaging a height of 2,600 m (8,500 ft) above sea level, this northern Andean plateau is situated in the country's eastern range and
696-561: The largest lake in South America. [REDACTED] Media related to Plateaus at Wikimedia Commons Mantle (geology) A mantle is a layer inside a planetary body bounded below by a core and above by a crust . Mantles are made of rock or ices , and are generally the largest and most massive layer of the planetary body. Mantles are characteristic of planetary bodies that have undergone differentiation by density . All terrestrial planets (including Earth ), half of
725-601: The most notable of which is the country's largest lake, Lake Taupō . The plateau stretches approximately 100 km east to west and 130 km north to south. The majority of the plateau is more than 600 metres above sea level. A tepui ( / ˈ t ɛ p w i / ), or tepuy ( Spanish: [teˈpuj] ), is a table-top mountain or mesa found in the Guiana Highlands of South America, especially in Venezuela and western Guyana . The word tepui means "house of
754-866: The south. The Deosai Plains in Pakistan are situated at an average elevation of 4,114 meters (13,497 ft) above sea level. They are considered to be the second highest plateaus in the world. Other major plateaus in Asia are: Najd on the Arabian Peninsula , elevation 762 to 1,525 m (2,500 to 5,003 ft), Armenian Highlands (≈400,000 km (150,000 sq mi), elevation 900–2,100 metres (3,000–6,900 ft)), Iranian Plateau (≈3,700,000 km (1,400,000 sq mi), elevation 300–1,500 metres (980–4,920 ft)), Anatolian Plateau , Mongolian Plateau (≈2,600,000 km (1,000,000 sq mi), elevation 1,000–1,500 metres (3,300–4,900 ft)), and
783-480: The surrounding coastline through enormous glaciers . The polar ice cap is so massive that the echolocation measurements of ice thickness have shown that large areas are below sea level . But, as the ice melts, the land beneath will rebound through isostasy and ultimately rise above sea level. The largest and highest plateau in the world is the Tibetan Plateau , sometimes metaphorically described as
812-546: The upland at 1,013 metres above sea level is Pinto Butte, which is located at the western end and straddles the watershed divide . Most of the watershed to the north of the hills is in the Old Wives Lake endorheic drainage basin with Wood River and its tributaries being the primary water course. The southern slopes drain primarily into the Milk River drainage basin . Some of the tributaries that flow south from
841-605: Was once called Gallayat Plateaus, rising 3,300 ft above sea level. Another very large plateau is the icy Antarctic Plateau , which is sometimes referred to as the Polar Plateau or King Haakon VII Plateau, home to the geographic South Pole and the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station , which covers most of East Antarctica where there are no known mountains but rather 3,000 m (9,800 ft) high of superficial ice and which spreads very slowly toward
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