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Gulf of Maine Coastal Lowland

Ecoregion in MA, NH, ME

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The Gulf of Maine Coastal Lowland ecoregion is a 10- to 20-mile wide coastal strip, stretching from Casco Bay in Maine to Plymouth Bay in Massachusetts. It is mostly an arcuate embayment type of coast, a different form from coastal ecoregions 82f and 82g to the northeast. Extensive glacial sand, silt, and clay deposits blanket this region, with a coastal pattern typified by plutonic capes and intervening sand beaches that front the region’s largest salt marshes. The ecoregion has relatively low relief, and elevations are mostly from sea level to 250 feet. Mt. Agamenticus, west of Ogunquit, Maine, is the atypical high spot at 691 feet. Bedrock geology consists mostly of metasedimentary rocks, intruded by several Paleozoic and Mesozoic plutonic bodies. Soils have a mesic temperature regime in most of the region, although frigid soils occur in the Maine portion. The vegetation mosaic includes white oak and red oak forests, some isolated chestnut oak woodlands, extensive post-settlement white pine, pitch pine in sandy areas, pitch pine bogs, some Atlantic white cedar swamps, red maple swamps, and Spartina saltmarsh. The vegetation contains some southern hardwood species (e.g., shagbark hickory, flowering dogwood, and chestnut oak) that reach the northern limit of their range within this ecoregion. There are also some subarctic maritime species that reach their southern limit in Ecoregion 59f, such as crowberry, golden heather, and oysterleaf. The region’s forests and farms are being rapidly converted to residential developments and bedroom communities of larger nearby cities.

— EPA

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