Landform Regions of Canada

The movement of the earth’s plates, and the resulting folding, faulting, and volcanic activity, have combined with the forces of erosion and weathering to create a variety of landscapes that affect the way we live and where we live.

A Landform Region is an area of the Earth with a unique set of physical features.�

Canada can be Divided into 7 distinct Landform Regions:

• Western Cordillera
• Interior Plains
• Canadian Shield
• Great Lakes-St.Lawrence Lowlands
• Appalachians
• Arctic - Hudson Bay Lowlands
• Innuitian Mountains

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Landform Regions of Canada

Western Cordillera

• Location:
• Along the western edge of Canada, covering most of Yukon territory and British Columbia
• Physical Features:
• Range after range of high, sharp-peaked mountains separated by plateaus and valleys, running North to South
• Created recently by the collision of the North American and Pacific plates
• Biological Features:
• Herbs, lichens and shrubs at higher elevations and various types of coniferous forest and grasslands at lower elevations
• Several species have adapted to the harsh climates of the higher elevations, including Mountain Goat.
• Mule Deer, Rocky Mountain Elk, Stone Sheep, Grizzly Bear and Black Bear are common at lower elevations.
• Resources:
• Lightly populated, travel is difficult
• Rich in minerals, timber, and sources of hydro electricity

Landform Regions of Canada

Interior Plains

• Location:
• Extends through the middle of Canada from North to South, covering most of Alberta and Saskatchewan, and some of NWT and Manitoba
• Physical Features:
• Very flat, with deep, fertile soil
• Created when sediments from the Shield and the Rocky Mountains were deposited in shallow inland seas and compressed into layers of sedimentary rock
• Cold winters, hot summers
• Biological Features:
• The southern part of the interior plains is mostly treeless, with grasses and herbs
• The northern part is home to a belt of coniferous trees called the boreal forest, which extends from the Rocky Mountains all the way across. Resources:
• Extensively used for farming wheat and cattle
• Known as Canada’s “Bread Basket”
• Sedimentary rock contains rich mineral, coal, oil and gas deposits

Landform Regions of Canada

Canadian Shield

• Location:
• Covers more than half of Canada, including most of Nunavut, Quebec, Labrador, Ontario, and Manitoba, and a large part of Saskatchewan
• Physical Features:
• Relatively flat with rounded hills of metamorphic rock, which are actually the roots of ancient mountains
• Some of the world’s oldest rocks can be found here, at or near the surface of the ground
• In the last ice-age, glaciers scraped soil away and formed many small lakes
• Biological Features:
• Covered by boreal forest in the south, and tundra in the north
• Many mammals such as moose, caribou, wolverines, weasels.
• Resources:
• Sparsely populated, farming is poor because the soil is too thin
• Rock contains large quantities of valuable metallic minerals such as lead, gold, nickel, copper and zinc

Landform Regions of Canada

Great Lakes-St.Lawrence �Lowlands

• Location:
• South of the Canadian Shield in Ontario and Quebec
• Smallest landform region in Canada
• Physical Description:
• Glaciers deposited a huge amount of soil, sand and gravel here, creating a landscape of flat plains.
• The great lakes are located in basins gouged out by the glaciers
• Biological Features:
• Prior heavy farming and urban sprawl, this area was home to large mixed forests
• Resources:
• 50% of Canada’s population lives here
• 70% of Canada’s manufacturing industries and located here
• Well-suited to farming because of excellent soils and warm climate

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Landform Regions of Canada

Appalachian Mountains

• Location:
• Covers some of southern Quebec, and most of the Maritime Provinces
• Physical Description:
• Oldest highland region in Canada, created when the North American plate collided with Europe and Africa about 300 million years ago
• EROSION has rounded the mountains over time, creating a landscape of rolling mountains and hills
• Biological Description:
• The Appalachians are characterized by a wealth of large, beautiful deciduous broadleaf (hardwood) trees.
• During the 19th and early 20th centuries the Appalachian forests were subject to severe and destructive logging and land clearing
• Animals that characterize the Appalachian forests include squirrels, rabbits and deer, which have greatly increased in abundance.
• Resources:
• Sedimentary rock rich in non-metallic minerals such as coal, with some igneous and metamorphic rock containing metallic minerals such as iron and zinc

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Landform Regions of Canada

Hudson Bay Lowlands

• Location:
• Around the southwestern shore of the Hudson Bay and James Bay in Ontario and Quebec
• Physical Features:
• This is a layer of sedimentary rock rests on top of the underlying Shield
• Flat low area covered by bogs and fens, and dotted with ponds, lakes and streams

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• Biological Features:
• Mostly muskeg or peat-forming wetlands
• The region is famous for its polar bears
• Caribou migrate to the area in summer
• In summer the coast of this region is alive with birds, such as lesser snow geese, Canada geese, brant, tundra swans, oldsquaw, king eider, and northern phalarope and many shore-birds

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Landform Regions of Canada

Arctic & Hudson Bay Lowlands

• Location:
• A series of islands located in Canada’s far north
• Physical Description:
• Low-lying, barren islands with coastlines ranging from extensive lowlands to spectacular cliffs
• Summer is brief, but sunny, it is cold and frozen in the winter
• It is dark all day in the winter and light all day in the summer
• Biological Features:
• Sparsely vegetated, with vast seemingly lifeless areas
• Resources:
• The ground is mostly composed of permafrost, making construction difficult and often hazardous, and agriculture virtually impossible

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Landform Regions of Canada

Innuitian Mountains

• Location:
• A mountain range in Canada's Arctic territories of Nunavut and the Northwest Territories
• Physical Description:
• In some locations they measure over 2,500 meters in height, and 1290 km in length
• Shaped at a time when the North American Plate moved northward
• They are younger than the Appalachians, and so erosion has not yet rounded them significantly
• Biological Features:
• They are above the tree line,

preventing any vegetation from

existing

• Resources:
• Largely unexplored, due to the

hostile climate. They are named

after the northern indigenous

people, who live in the region.

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