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| Flora, Fauna, and Climate of the Smokies | |||||||||||||||||
| Flora in the Great Smokies | Fauna of the Great Smokies | ||||||||||||||||
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The beautiful colors throughout the park in the spring, summer, and fall months is due to the large diversity of flowering plants and trees. The first blooms are found in the valleys around April and reaches the peaks sometime in July. The changing of colors in the fall starts in mid-August at the peaks and recedes to the valleys until October. Both Northern and Southern vegetation are found in the Smokies, with plants common in Georgia in the valleys and evergreen forests like those of Maine in the peaks. There are many types of flowers in the park, but these are some of thee most common. The bloodroot plant (Sanguinaria canadensis) grows along the streams in wooded areas and receives its name from the Mative Americans who used its stem to make red dye. The Bluet (Houstonia caerulea) blooms from April until June in meadows and grassy slopes with its pale blue blossom with a yellow center that is about 1.5 inches wide. The Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) is a member of the sunflower family with pink or white flowers are found in flat-top clusters and the Latin name comes from the Greek hero, Achilles, which legend has it he discovered the blood, clotting abilities of this plant. The Fungi in the park are also numerous, with at least 2,000 species of mushrooms alone. The honey mushroom (Armillaria mella) is one of three mushrooms that actually give off light at night. The plant grows into rotting logs or tree stumps where the glowing rootlike filaments are, which often make it look like the wood itself is glowing. There are obviously many trees in the park, over 200 species, more than are located in all of northern Europe. The Black Cherry tree (Prunus serotina) is the biggest native cherry tree, growing up to 60 feet high with white blossoms in the spring and leaves that turn red or yellow in the fall. The Black locust (Robinia pseudo acacia) have forking, irregular trunks with aromatic white flowers in late spring and flat, brown pods of fruit that appear in the fall and split open in the winter. The mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia) is a common evergreen shrub from along the East coast with small pink and white flowers appearing in the spring in clusters of pointed buds with long and narrow leaves. There are many life zones in the Smokies. These various ecological communities are most often identified by forest types. Life zone locations are determined by elevaton, soil, moisture or dryness, and exposure to the wind or sun. THe COVE HARWOOD FOREST is below 4,500 feet where deciduoud forests cover the ground and extend to the lower elevations. Many trees are at or near record size. Common are yellow buckeye, basswood, yellow poplar, white ash, sugar maple, yellow birch, and black cherry. Rhododendrons and lady's slippers are common flowering plants. PINE AND OAK FOREST predominateto about 3,000 feet on dry slopes compared to other parts of the park. Common are hickories, yellow poplar, and flowering dogwood. They are located in the park around Cades Cove. HEMLOCK FOREST grow along streams and on slopes and ridges up to 5,000 feet. Maple, birch, cherry, and yellow poplar trees are found here. They are located along Newfound Gap Road and Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail. NORTHERN HARDWOOD FOREST have yellow birch and American beech trees dominating, occuring mainly above 4,500 feet. Maple, buckeye, and cherry trees can also be found. Shrubs are also located in this life zone, including Catawba and rosebay rhododendrons, hydrangea, thornless blackberry, and hobblebush. Flowering plants include creeping bluets, trilliums, long-spurred violets, and trout lily. They are located at Newfound Gap and along Clingman's Dome Road. SPRUCE-FIR FOREST are located above 4,500 feet with red spruce and the few remaining Fraser firs (90 percent of these trees were lost to insect infestation). Many coniferous trees found here reminds visitors of Maine or Quebec. Above the 6,000 foot mark are yellow birch, pin cherry, American mountain ash, and mountain maple appear. Plants include dingleberry, blackberries, blueberries, Carolina and Catawba rhododendroms, and ferns such as hay-scented, lady, and common polypody. They are found along the Appalacian Trail and the Spruce-Fir Nature Trail along Clingman's Dome Road. Here is also a guide to the spectacular colors found in the park in the fall. Yellow leaves are often flowering beech, birch, black gum, buckeye, hickory, mountain ash, and yellow poplar trees. Scarlet would represent the red maple tree. Red represents dogwood, maple, pin cherry, sourwood, and sumac trees. Crimson is either a blackberry or a blueberry bush. Mixture of colors could be quite a number of plants, but here are a few. Sugar maple (yellow, scarlet, orange), sweet gum (red, yellow, dark purple), red maple, northern red oak, pin cherry (orange, red), buckeye, and witch hobble (yellow, red) trees. The soil in the Smokies is mainly a forest soil. Forest soils consist of podsols. Podsols are most commonly found in temperate, humid climates beneath forest vegetation. It is a member of hte pedalfer group of soils. It occurs mainly in deciduous forest biomes. It has a dark layer at the very top just beneath the plant cover called the humic zone in the top of the A Horizon. The bulk of the A Horizon is just below and is a light gray. It is also heavily leached. The B zone is thin and shows up dark due to the iron oxides that accumulate there. This zone in turn grades down to the C horizon, the parent material, which is usually unconsolidated sandy deposit. SOURCE: www.americanparknetwork.com/parkinfo/sm/ COPYRIGHT 1996 Meredith Corporation |
There is also a very diverse group of animals found in the Great Smokey Mountains. There are Mammels, birds, insects, and amphibians all in the park. In the Mammels section, are the muskrats (Ondatra zibethica). They are most active at night and live along the streams of the parkin small underground dens. Also in the mammels is the red fox (Vulpes vulpes) which is about the size of a medium-sized dog with a reddish tint. It is very shy towards humans and sleeps mainly during the day and is awake at night (nocturnal). The southern flying squirrel (Glaucomys volans), which is the smallest of the tree squirrels, is also a mammel of the park. Is is nocturnal and has the ability to glide down from trees, uses flaps of skin on its sides as a makeshift parachute. The red squirrel (Sciurus hudsonicus) is locally known as a "boomer" because of the load and constant chattering it produces. The white tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) is found mainly in the Cades Cove area of the park, but are by no means special or unique to the park, being able to be found throughout the continental United States. Two of the more dominant mammels are the black bear (Ursus americanus) and the European wild hog (Sus scrofa). The black bear is the most common of the two, so I have elected to type more about it. This great animal seems to be able to attract visitors to the park more than almost any other feature there. Approximately 500 bears live in the park, averageing 200 to 400 pounds in weight. Bears are NOT true hibernators, however, because they do not become dorment and can be awakened. The mother bear actually gives birth in her sleep, usually in January or February, and awakens in March to find a litter of cubs at her side. Black bears are highly intelligent and extremely powerful. They naturally feed on berries, nuts, seeds, acorns, and insects, but often seek human food. Some bears in the park have been known to pry open car doors to get objects they think are food. The main two birds in the park are the northern flicker (Colaptes auratus) and the red-eyed vireo (Vireo olivaceus). The northern flicker is the only woodpecker in North America to eat ants from the ground by licking them with its long tongue. It pecks the wood as a mating call or to claim territory. The red-eyed vireo is nicknamed the "preacher" because it sings throughout the day, even when catching and eating insects. The name comes from the bird's large, reddish-brown eyes. Insects in the park include nearly 100 species of butterflies, including the Great Smokies fritillary (Speyeria diana) and the pipe-vine swallowtail (Battus philenor). Both butterflies resemble the other, a great defense for the Great Smokies fritillary. This is because the pipe-vine swallowtail eats Dutchman's-pipe vines making it distasteful to predators. Often the predators mistake the Great Smokies fritillary for the pipe-vine swallowtail and leave it alone, not wanting the bad taste. SOURCE: www.americanparknetwork.com/parkinfo/sm/ COPYRIGHT '96 Meredith Corporation | ||||||||||||||||
| Climate of the Smokies | |||||||||||||||||
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The climatic conditions within the Great Smokey Mountains National Park varies greatly. The foot of the Smokies, near Gatlinburg, has a subtropical moist climate. Suptropical moist climates have warm to hot summers and cool winters with moderate precipitation throughout the year. The higher peaks in the mountains, such as Clingman's Dome, the highest point in the park at 6,643 feet above sea level, have continental moist climates. These climates have more of a warm to cool summer and cold winter with precipitation in all seasons. At Clingman's Dome, July is the warmest month month, with an average high of 65 and an average low of 53. It is also the wettest month, averageing 8.3 inches with 13 days of precipitation. September is the dryest month with averages of 5.1 inches and 8 days of precipitation. February averages the coolest temperatures of the year, at an average high of 35 and low of 18 (all temperatures in this report are degrees ferenheit). The conditions in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, however, are different. July is still the warmest and wettest month, but with an average high and low of 88 and 59 and only 10 days of precipitation for a total average of 5.7 inches precipitaion. September is still the dryest month, but only with 3.0 inches and 5 days precipitation average. January, not February, is the coolest month, but still quite mild as aveages are 51 for a high and a low of 28. Much of the precipitation in the Great Smokies comes when cold air masses (cold fronts) and the warmer, much wetter air masses originating in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean collide. The warmer, less dense air is forced over the colder air, where the water vapor is cooled and condensed and falls in the form of rain. This is also a major cause of severe thunderstorms found throughout the United States, but mainly in the Midwest and Central Plains. Erosion is becoming a big problem in the Smokies. The Smokies aren't that tall, so they don't create much of a rain shadow effect, but they do force quite a bit of rain to fall near the peaks. This then creates water runoff. There are streams of runoff located throughout the park, as seen just by driving through the park, and this is creating some weathering and erosion of mostly smaller particles already fairly loose. The other main cause of weathering and erosion (and reason for the loose particles that are swept away by the water runoff) is the wind coming out of the plains to the west. However, little erosion is noticed due to uplift. The Appalacian Mountains, the chain the Smokies are found in, used to be the tallest Mountains in the world, which created a bulge in the magma below the plates due to the extreme weight of these mountains. Now, as the mountains are being eroded away, they are losing that weight. This allows the magma to push the mountian chain back up (uplift) and this is occuring at about the same rate as the erosion, so the mountains are staying about the some height. | |||||||||||||||||
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