Have you ever travelled across land where the sky seems bigger than the countryside around you? If so you probably saw a part of the earth called a plain. The land is so flat that you can see great distances all around.
Most plains are lower than the land around them, but they are not deep like a valley. Many people live on plains because the soil is good for farming. Also, building homes and roads is easier on the flat land of plains than it is in mountainous places.
Plains may be found along a coast or inland. Coastal plains are lowlands that stretch along an ocean’s shore. They might be elevated parts of the ocean floor. Or they can be formed by solid materials carried off by water from other coastal plains. Coastal plains usually rise from sea level until they meet higher land, such as mountains.
Inland plains may be found at high levels. The Great Plains, which cover part of the U.S.A. and Canada, slope upwards from about 600 to 1,000 metres above sea level. There they meet the Rocky Mountains.
Thick forests thrive in the damp air along coastal plains. Other plains, like those in which the sky seems so big, have few trees, but they have lots of grasses.
Picture Credit : Google