The hummocky highlands that straddle the border between the U.S. state of North Dakota and the Canadian province of Manitoba are called the Turtle Mountains.
The hummocky highlands that straddle the border between the U.S. state of North Dakota and the Canadian province of Manitoba are called the Turtle Mountains. They are modest-sized for mountains, part of a plateau that rises just 600 to 800 feet (180 to 240 meters) above the surrounding plains.
However, the increased elevation results in an additional 10 inches (25 centimeters) of precipitation per year, enough to support hardwood forests rather than grasslands. (A process called the orographic effect enhances precipitation at higher elevations when topography forces passing air upward and causes water vapor to cool and condense into clouds.)
The forests stand out in this snowy view of the plateau, captured by the MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) on NASA’s Terra satellite on January 3, 2025. Forests cover about half of the plateau, appearing darker than the surrounding snow-covered wetlands, farmland, and grasslands. Trembling aspen, bur oak, balsam poplar, and green ash dominate, providing habitat for a variety of animals including fox, weasel, badger, deer, marten, and moose.
Read more at NASA Earth Observatory
Image: NASA Earth Observatory image by Wanmei Liang, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS LANCE and GIBS/Worldview.
