Northern New York

Map of Selected Regions in New York

Blue: Franklin County
Orange: Essex County
Green: Fort Drum (Jefferson County)

Climographs

Soil

Franklin County

Source: websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov

Essex County

Source: websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov

Jefferson County

Source: websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov

Description:

New York is a vast state with many neighbors, including: New Jersey, Vermont, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and even Canada. This diversity allow extends into the state itself, the state being home to various types of physical environments. Before going to New York, I always thought of it having one of the biggest cities in the United States and did not think much about how much of the outdoors the state had to offer. One of the biggest regions is located in central to northern New York, a place called Adirondack Park. This area has many different ponds, lakes, mountains, valleys, and more.

From this area in New York, I chose to focus on Franklin County and Essex County. Franklin County is home to many of the ponds and lakes in this area of New York, and forms lowlands with more vegetation than Essex County. Essex County, while neighboring Franklin, has some of the highest elevations in the area, one of the most being about 5,500 feet high. In Essex you see lesser vegetation than in Franklin. However, while the physical properties and landforms differ in these two regions, the dominant soil type is still fine sandy loam in both. The climates in these regions are roughly the same, but precipitation in Essex County is greater than Franklin slightly.

The last region I chose to focus on was the military base Fort Drum, and more broader Jefferson County. This county is further east than the other two, and is not located in the Adirondack Park. Here the physical environment has been altered by human interactions, and as such the terrain is more flat. The dominant soil type here is silty clay, but it still has some of the fine sandy loam found in the first two regions. The climate here reflects about the same temperature as the other two regions, with a little bit lower temperature in the later half of the year and an overall decrease in precipitation.

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Shasta National Forest: Biotic Communities and Disturbance Regime

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