Stephanie Walters
Resources created by Stephanie Walters
Records 1–16 of 16 displayed
- Acidic cove forest on a mountain creek
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 11
- The water that runs off the high slopes and off the Highlands Plateau is quickly organized into creeks and begins its descent towards the sea. The upper reaches of these creeks are too small to have great erosive power, but they can still carry sediments downstream...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Algae
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 14
- The rocks closest to the base of the falls get the heaviest spray. These rocks remain wet at all times and therefore make excellent places for the growth of attached algae. The green patches on the rocks shown in Figure 11 are algae. There are most obvious...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- The bottom of the falls
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 16
- As one moves further back from the falls, the spray community becomes even more diverse as grasses and broad-leafed plants find suitable habitats among the boulders and downed trees at the bottom of the waterfalls.
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Channeling air from the south
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 7
- A comparable ridge on the east is shown in Figure 4. The two sides of the bowl contain the northward flowing air and force it to rise up over the highlands represented by Whiteside Mountain and other peaks along the Blue Ridge.
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Diverse species
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 10
- The forests of the high slopes are mixed mesophytic forests found on creek and river slopes. Those found below 2,500 feet in open areas are characterized by a greater richness of species than is found in any other vegetation type in the region. This richness...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Forests on the highland plateaus
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 9
- The upper slopes of the Blue Ridge support forests similar to those found at lower elevations much further north. Figure 6 shows one of these that are dominated by the Canadian hemlock and many other species, including the beeches and birches that characterize...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Granite cliffs at Whiteside Mountain
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 6
- Figure 3 shows the topography that concentrates and elevates air currents from the south as they reach the Blue Ridge escarpment. This is a photograph taken from Whiteside Mountain showing the granite cliffs that are its most striking feature as well as the...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- How were the Jocassee Gorges formed?
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 2
- Basically, erosion formed the Jocassee Gorges. For most of its length, the eastern continental divide, which separates land that drains to the Atlantic Ocean from land that drains to the Gulf of Mexico, runs northeast to southwest parallel to the Blue Ridge...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- North Carolina's rain forest
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 1
- The Blue Ridge escarpment is the steep slope that separates North Carolina's mountains from its Piedmont plateau. The escarpment trends north and east across the state from South Carolina to Virginia. In many places it is steep enough to rise over 1,500 feet...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Rain and the forest
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 5
- The source of the water that cascades down the gorges is shown in Figure 2. This photograph was taken in mid-afternoon on an August day and shows thunderheads boiling up on the south side of the Blue Ridge at the head of the gorges. It rained within an hour...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Rainbow Falls
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 12
- With Figure 9 we reach our destination, the river and falls that are the most striking geographic feature of the gorge region. This is the Horsepasture River with its Rainbow Falls, which drops over 100 feet in the single cascade shown here. Two other smaller...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Slope forest
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 17
- Finally, the spray community gives way to the forests that dominate the slopes above it. A typical slope forest is shown in Figure 15 behind Turtleback Falls, one of the two cascades above Rainbow Falls. Turtleback Falls is a favorite cascade sliding spot....
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- The spray zone
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 13
- One of the unique features of the Jocassee Gorges region is the plant community that flourishes in the spray zone around the base of the waterfalls. Figure 10 shows visible evidence of the spray that sustains these unusual communities. If you look closely...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Spray zone community
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 15
- On the sides of the waterfall the spray community becomes more diverse than the algae that grows at the bottom. These communities are perpetually wet but are less exposed to the destructive torrents that crash down the falls in periods of extreme high water....
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Wetland bogs
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 8
- The waterfalls may be the most spectacular features of this forested region, but unusual plant communities also flourish in the rain forest climate. By starting near the top of a gorge and working our way down to the waterfalls, we can see a range of such...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.
- Why are there so many rare plants in Jocassee Gorges?
- In Jocassee Gorges: Temperate rain forests of the Blue Ridge, page 3
- The topography of Jocassee Gorges is responsible for the incredible rainfall the area receives, and thus is also ultimately responsible for the many rare and endemic plants of the region. The shape of the gorges causes the rising air, thunderheads, and rainfall...
- By Dirk Frankenberg and Stephanie Walters.