North Mountain (Nova Scotia)

Last updated
North Mountain
AnnapolisRoyalNSSkyline.jpg
North Mountain ridge above Granville Ferry, Nova Scotia
Highest point
Peak Mount Rose
Elevation 235 m (771 ft)
Coordinates 45°6′0″N64°45′0″W / 45.10000°N 64.75000°W / 45.10000; -64.75000
Geography
North Mountain.jpg
Location of North Mountain
CountryCanada
ProvincesNova Scotia
Topo map NTS 21A Annapolis Royal
21B Eastport
21H Amherst
Geology
Age of rock Triassic
Type of rock Igneous
North Mountain (Nova Scotia)
Invisible Square.svg
Invisible Square.svg
Mapscaleline.svg
50km
30miles
Red pog.svg
Five Islands
Invisible Square.svg
Red pog.svg
Margaretsville
Red pog.svg
Digby Neck
Invisible Square.svg
Red pog.svg
Digby Gut
Invisible Square.svg
Red pog.svg
Cape Split
Invisible Square.svg
Minas Basin
Bay of Fundy
N O R T H M O U N T A I N R I D G E
N O V A S C O T I A
Red pog.svg
Brier Island
Invisible Square.svg
Canada Nova Scotia location map 2.svg
Location of North Mountain Ridge on the southern shore of the Bay of Fundy

North Mountain (French: Montagne du Nord; Gaelic: Beinn a Tuath) is a narrow southwest-northeast trending volcanic ridge on the mainland portion of southwestern Nova Scotia, stretching from Brier Island to Cape Split. It forms the northern edge of the Annapolis Valley along the shore of the Bay of Fundy. Together with South Mountain, the two ranges form the Annapolis Highlands region. [ citation needed ]

Contents

North Mountain rises dramatically from the valley floor and tapers somewhat more gradually to the north and west where it meets the coast, although many parts of this coast have vertical cliffs rising higher than 30 metres, most notably at Cape Split. A break occurs at Digby Gut where a gap in the mountain ridge is filled by a deep tidal channel separating the eastern end of the mountain from Digby Neck.

The highest point on the ridge is at Mount Rose in Annapolis County, north of Lawrencetown.

Geology

The ridge traces its history to the Triassic period when this part of Nova Scotia occupied the center of the supercontinent Pangaea. It is a 201 million year old sequence of tholeiitic basalts, which contains columnar jointing. The basalts also extend under the Bay of Fundy and parts of it are exposed on the shore at Five Islands, east of Parrsboro on the north side of the bay. [1] Numerous sediment-filled fissures are present near the upper surface of North Mountain. The hard ridge of basalt resisted the grinding of ice sheets that flowed over the region during past ice ages, and now forms one side of the Annapolis Valley in western part of the Nova Scotia peninsula.

North Mountain is believed to have formed during the opening of the Atlantic Ocean. [2] It is a portion of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province, which is a gigantic flood basalt and intrusive complex along east coast of the United States, Europe, northwest Africa and South America with a diameter of 4,000 km.

A viscous (<175 m) North Mountain flow at McKay Head shows ~25-cm-thick distinguished layers separated by ~130 centimeter of basalt in its upper 34 meters. Upper layers (5 meters below the lava top) are extremely vesicular while lower ones are pegmatitic and include a narrow (~2 cm) rhyolite band. The layering of the flow closely resemble that of some Hawaiian lava lakes. [3]

Columnar basalt may be seen at Baxters Harbour and at Brier Island.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annapolis Valley</span> Economic region in Nova Scotia, Canada

The Annapolis Valley is a valley and region in the province of Nova Scotia, Canada. It is located in the western part of the Nova Scotia peninsula, formed by a trough between two parallel mountain ranges along the shore of the Bay of Fundy. Statistics Canada defines the Annapolis Valley as an economic region, composed of Annapolis County, Kings County, and Hants County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bay of Fundy</span> Bay on the east coast of North America

The Bay of Fundy is a bay between the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, with a small portion touching the U.S. state of Maine. It is an arm of the Gulf of Maine. Its tidal range is the highest in the world. The name is probably a corruption of the French word fendu, meaning 'split'.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Minas Basin</span> Inlet in the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia, Canada

The Minas Basin is an inlet of the Bay of Fundy and a sub-basin of the Fundy Basin located in Nova Scotia, Canada. It is known for its extremely high tides.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brier Island</span>

Brier Island is an island in the Bay of Fundy in Digby County, Nova Scotia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annapolis Basin</span> Shallow inlet on the east coast of Nova Scotia, Canada

The Annapolis Basin is a sub-basin of the Bay of Fundy, located on the bay's southeastern shores, along the northwestern shore of Nova Scotia and at the western end of the Annapolis Valley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central Atlantic magmatic province</span> Largest continental igneous province on Earth

The Central Atlantic magmatic province (CAMP) is the Earth's largest continental large igneous province, covering an area of roughly 11 million km2. It is composed mainly of basalt that formed before Pangaea broke up in the Mesozoic Era, near the end of the Triassic and the beginning of the Jurassic periods. The subsequent breakup of Pangaea created the Atlantic Ocean, but the massive igneous upwelling provided a legacy of basaltic dikes, sills, and lavas now spread over a vast area around the present central North Atlantic Ocean, including large deposits in northwest Africa, southwest Europe, as well as northeast South America and southeast North America. The name and CAMP acronym were proposed by Andrea Marzoli and adopted at a symposium held at the 1999 Spring Meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cape Split</span> Headland in Nova Scotia, Canada

Cape Split is a headland located on the Bay of Fundy coast of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. The Battle off Cape Split happened during the American Revolution.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Long Island (Nova Scotia)</span>

Long Island is a Canadian island in Digby County, Nova Scotia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Digby Neck</span> Peninsula of Nova Scotia in the Bay of Fundy

Digby Neck is a Canadian peninsula extending into the Bay of Fundy in Digby County, Nova Scotia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Volcanism of Canada</span> Volcanic activity in Canada

Volcanic activity is a major part of the geology of Canada and is characterized by many types of volcanic landform, including lava flows, volcanic plateaus, lava domes, cinder cones, stratovolcanoes, shield volcanoes, submarine volcanoes, calderas, diatremes, and maars, along with less common volcanic forms such as tuyas and subglacial mounds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nova Scotia peninsula</span> Peninsula in Nova Scotia

The Nova Scotia peninsula is a peninsula on the Atlantic coast of North America. It is called Enmigtaqamu'g in the Mi'kmaw language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Partridge Island (Nova Scotia)</span>

Partridge Island is a significant historical, cultural and geological site located near the mouth of Parrsboro Harbour and the town of Parrsboro on the Minas Basin, in Cumberland County, Nova Scotia, Canada. It attracts many visitors including sightseers, swimmers, photographers, hikers and amateur geologists. Partridge Island is actually a peninsula that is connected to the mainland by a sandbar isthmus. According to local legend, the isthmus was created during the Saxby Gale of 1869. The hiking trail to the top of the island affords scenic views of key landforms on the Minas Basin including Cape Blomidon, Cape Split and Cape Sharp. The nearby Ottawa House By-the-Sea Museum contains artifacts and exhibits illustrating the history of the former village at Partridge Island, which dates from the 1770s. Partridge Island is a favourite hunting ground for rockhounds because its ancient sandstone and basalt cliffs are steadily eroded by the fast-moving currents of the world's highest tides. Rocks and debris worn away from its cliffs are dragged down the beach making it possible to find gemstones, exotic-looking zeolite minerals and fossils. Fossil hunters are warned, however, that although one or two loose specimens may be collected, Nova Scotia law requires that they be sent or taken to a museum for further study, and no fossils may be excavated from bedrock without a permit.

The Thumb is a mountain located 7 km (4 mi) south of Sitchiada Mountain on the east side of Bear Lake, on the divide between the upper Omineca River and the basin of the Bear River in the Omineca Country of the Central-North Interior of British Columbia, Canada. As the Omineca is part of the Arctic Ocean drainage, via the Peace and Mackenzie Rivers, and the Bear is in the basin of the Skeena River, which drains to the Pacific, The Thumb is located on the Continental Divide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Baxters Harbour</span>

Baxters Harbour is a former fishing community on the shore of the Bay of Fundy in Kings County, Nova Scotia, Canada, located 15 kilometres from Kentville. It was named for Dr. William Baxter and his son John Baxter who lived there in the early nineteenth century. It is believed that fishing started there about 1780.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fundy Basin</span> Sediment-filled rift basin on the Atlantic coast of southeastern Canada

The Fundy Basin is a sediment-filled rift basin on the Atlantic coast of southeastern Canada. It contains three sub-basins; the Fundy sub-basin, the Minas Basin and the Chignecto Basin. These arms meet at the Bay of Fundy, which is contained within the rift valley. From the Bay of Fundy, the Minas Basin trends northeast to Nova Scotia. Chignecto Bay runs from the Bay of Fundy northwest between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia which is separated from the waters of the Northumberland Strait by the Isthmus of Chignecto. The Fundy Basin is best known for the bay it contains. The Bay of Fundy is home to huge tidal changes and tidal bores. It is part of the system of Eastern North America Rift Basins.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Isle Haute</span>

Isle Haute is an island in the upper regions of Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, near the entrance to the Minas Basin. It is 16 kilometers from Harbourville and eight kilometers south-southwest of Cape Chignecto. The island is part of Cumberland County, Nova Scotia and is three kilometres (1.9 mi) long and 400 metres (1,300 ft) wide. The Mi'kmaq used the island to make stone tools before Europeans arrived and called the island "Maskusetik", meaning place of wild beans, hidden oats. In 1604, Samuel de Champlain gave the present name to the island, which means "High Island" in French, when he observed the towering bluffs, timber and fresh-water springs. The steep 100 m (328 ft) basalt cliffs of the island are the result from volcanic eruptions in the Jurassic period and may have been connected to the North Mountain volcanic ridge on the mainland 200 million years ago, before the Bay of Fundy was formed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Volcanism of Eastern Canada</span>

The volcanism of Eastern Canada includes the hundreds of volcanic areas and extensive lava formations in Eastern Canada. The region's different volcano and lava types originate from different tectonic settings and types of volcanic eruptions, ranging from passive lava eruptions to violent explosive eruptions. Eastern Canada has very large volumes of magmatic rock called large igneous provinces. They are represented by deep-level plumbing systems consisting of giant dike swarms, sill provinces and layered intrusions. The most capable large igneous provinces in Eastern Canada are Archean age greenstone belts containing a rare volcanic rock called komatiite.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Digby Gut</span>

The Digby Gut is a narrow channel connecting the Bay of Fundy with the Annapolis Basin. The town of Digby, Nova Scotia is located on the inner portion of the western side of the Gut. The eastern entrance is marked by the Point Prim Lighthouse. Strong tidal currents, numerous rocky ledges, frequent fogs and unpredictable winds make it a dangerous passage requiring a pilot or local knowledge to navigate. Tide flows create 5 knot tidal currents and create numerous whirlpools and eddies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bear River (Nova Scotia)</span> River in Nova Scotia, Canada

The Bear River is a minor river in western Nova Scotia, Canada. Flowing from south to north, it is 40 kilometres (25 mi) long from its headwaters to its discharge into the Annapolis Basin, some 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) east of Digby. The river is tidal for the last 9.7 kilometres (6.0 mi) of its length. The community of Bear River is situated near the head of the tide where shipbuilding took place in the nineteenth century.

References