GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATIO

N ON NORTH

AMERICA

SOMETHING ABOUT NORTH

AMERICA North America is the 3rd largest continent. Twenty-four (24) countries make up the continent of

North America. About 502 million people live in North America. Most North Americans speak English, Spanish, or

French. North America was named after the explorer

Americo Vespucci. Mexico City, Mexico is the largest city in North

America. North America is the only continent that has every

kind of climate. Mount McKinley, in Alaska, is the tallest point on the

continent. Death Valley, in California, is the lowest point on the

continent.

ITS MAP Description about Map

North America is the third-largest continent and is spread over 9,540,000 sq miles. The continent encompasses 23 independent states including the US, Canada, and Mexico. The Map of North America points out all the capital cities such as Ottawa, Washington DC, Mexico City, Guatemala, San Salvador, Managua, San Jose, Panama City, Tegucigalpa, Belmopan, Kingston, Havana, Nassau, Santo Domingo, Port of Spain, Port-su-Prince, and Nassau.

ITS FLAGs

ITS PHYSIOGRAPHY North America may be divided into at least five major physiographic regions:

Canadian Shield: This is a geologically stable area of rock dating between 2.5 and 4 Gya that occupies most of the northeastern quadrant, including Greenland.

Appalachian Mountains: The Appalachians are an old and eroded system that formed about 300 Ma and extends from the Gaspé Peninsula to Alabama.

Atlantic Coastal Plain: The plain is a belt of lowlands widening to the south that extends from south New England to Mexico.

Interior Lowlands:The lowlands extend down the middle of the continent from the Mackenzie Valley to the Atlantic Coastal Plain, and include the Great Plains on the west and the agriculturally productive Interior Plains on the east.

North American Cordillera: The cordillera is

a complex belt of mountains and associated plateaus and basins some of which were formed as recently as 100–65 Ma, during the Cretaceous. The cordillera extend from Alaska into Mexico and includes two orogenic belts — the Pacific Margin on the west and the Rocky Mountains on the east — separated by a system of intermontane plateaus and basins.

ITS CLIMATEThe climate in North America is typically cool and humid. The rainy zone disproportionately extends in America, and as the continent stretches over the climatic zones, vegetation is remarkably distinctive. Great indentations of the shoreline make insular conditions to prevail in much of its interior. The area along the west coast tends to be milder and wetter than other areas with the same latitude.

ITS GEOGRAPHY North America occupies the northern

portion of the landmass generally referred to as the New World, the Western Hemisphere, the Americas, or simply America (which, less commonly, is considered by some as a single continent with North America a subcontinent). North America's only land connection to South America is at the Isthmus of Panama.

The continent is delimited on the southeast by most geographers at the Darién watershed along the Colombia-Panama border, placing all of Panama within North America. Alternatively, less common views would end North America at the man-made Panama Canaland some geologists physiographically locate its southern limit at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Mexico, with Central America extending southeastward to South America from this point. The Caribbean islands, or West Indies, are considered part of North America.

ITS VEGETATION There are various plant life distributions in North America. Plant life in the Arctic includes grasses, mosses, and Arctic willows. Coniferous trees, including spruces, pines, hemlocks, and firs, are indigenous to the Canadian and Western U.S.mountain ranges as far south as San Francisco. Among these are giant sequoias, redwoods, great firs, and sugar pines. Sugar pines are generally confined to the northwestern area of the United States.

The central region of the country has hardwoods. Southern states grow extensive yellow pines. In addition, mahogany, logwood, and lignumvitae - all tropical in nature - are grown. The southwest has desert plants, including yucci and cacti. The cultivated native plants of North America are tobacco, maize, potato, vanilla, melon, cacao, gourds, indigo plant, and bean.

ITS NATURAL RESOURCES North America, the third-largest continent, extends

from the tiny Aleutian Islands in the northwest to the Isthmus of Panama in the south. 

North Americas physical geography, environment andresources, and human geography can be considered separately.

North America benefits greatly from its fertile soils, plentifulfreshwater, oil and mineral deposits, and forests. With a strong domestic and export economy focused on this abundant array of natural resources, North America has become one of the most developed regions in the world.

ITS MINERALS

ITS WATER RESOURCES The water resources of the continent vary with

regions. In northern Alaska, the Canadian North, and Greenland, they are low, mainly because they are locked up in ice most of the year; when the summer melt comes, runoff is high. Central Alaska and mid-northern Canada have a moderate precipitation of from 12 to 15 inches per year, but again much of this is locked up in winter ice. The spring melt leads to extensive flooding, which makes the control of water difficult. Late summers are dry, but evaporation is low. Though rivers dwindle, they generally carry enough water to meet demand.

The Great Plains area also has marked high- and low-water periods, the latter posing serious problems. Most rivers rise in mountains to the west, where usually there are extensive snows. Meltwater gives an early spring flush, and high flow is continued into early summer through storms generated by the tropical gulf air. In late summer and fall, however, the storms cease, and the rivers drop. Streamflow originating within the region may dry up, while bigger rivers may sink into braided channels between bars of sand. Evapotranspiration also exceeds precipitation, a loss not made up again until early winter with the return of polar-front storms. Surface water therefore is scarce for four to five months and often needs to be supplemented from groundwater.

ITS ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS  North America has been struggling immensely

since the last century with air and water pollution, deforestation, and overpopulation. These struggles are due to poor prevention planning and industrial manifestation. Pollution is changing the atmosphere much sooner than expected and global warming is predicted to overwhelm the atmosphere within the next half of a century. In order to sustain the environment and atmosphere humans must take immediate action right now. The longer we wait to start immediate prevention, the sooner our air and water supplies will diminish.    

Unfortunately, it is not only North America that needs to

change it is many other countries and regions of the world. Prevention and preservation is up to every citizen, business, and government organization by changing the way they all reduce, reuse, and recycle products to change the bad habits humans have been illogically doing in the past century. Taking care of our most precious resources and preserving them for our future generations to come should be one of the top priorities of our time. Preserving water and air, and using smart growth plans are the key to sustaining the needs of the human race. The high economic growth of the United States depends on fast-paced industrializing and manufacturing. This contradicts with scientists who imply that the whole world's actions and plans need to change in order to save most of the species living on the earth today.   

HOW WAS IT DISCOVERED? The Americas are usually accepted as

having been named after the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci by the German cartographers Martin Waldseemüller and Matthias Ringmann.Vespucci, who explored South America between 1497 and 1502, was the first European to suggest that the Americas were not the East Indies, but a different landmass previously unknown by Europeans.

In 1507, Waldseemüller produced a world map, in which he placed the word "America" on the continent of South America, in the middle of what is today Brazil. 

OF NORTH AMERICA

ITS POPULATION

THE ENDThanks for

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