ROCKY MOUNTAINS
LOCATION: The Rocky Mountains stretch more than 3,000 miles from Canada to New Mexico along western North America. They are the continent’s largest mountain system.
AREA: 382,894 square miles
HIGHEST PEAK: Mount Elbert (14,400 feet) in Colorado
MINERALS PRESENT: copper, silver, gold, lead, zinc, molybdenum, beryllium, uranium
Mountain Zones
by Mike Weinstein
Climbing a mountain is like traveling to a faraway place. On a mountain, the scenery changes as you go higher because it gets colder and wetter at higher elevations. In the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, each zone of elevation has its own lifeforms.
Alpine tundra Above 11,500 feet, the alpine tundra marks the timberline. No trees grow above the timberline because it is too cold and windy. Plants in the tundra are tiny and hardy. Rodents,…