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Southern Metasedimentary Mountains

Ecoregion in Appalachian Mountains, Blue Ridge in GA, TN, NC

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The Southern Metasedimentary Mountains are steep, dissected, biologicallydiverse mountains that include Clingmans Dome (6643 feet), the highest point in Tennessee. The Precambrian-age metamorphic and sedimentary geologic materials are generally older and more metamorphosed than the Southern Sedimentary Ridges (66e) to the west and north. The Appalachian oak forests and, at higher elevations, the northern hardwoods forests include a variety of oaks and pines, as well as silverbell, hemlock, yellow poplar, basswood, buckeye, yellow birch, and beech. Spruce-fir forests, found generally above 5500 feet, have been affected greatly over the past twenty-five years by the balsam woolly aphid. The Copper Basin, in the southeast corner of Tennessee, was the site of copper mining and smelting from the 1850’s to 1987, and once left more than fifty square miles of eroded bare earth.

— EPA

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