Foothills

Hills before a mountain range For other uses, see Foothill (disambiguation). This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.Find sources: "Foothills" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) Rocky Mountain foothills near Denver, Colorado Foothills or piedmont are geographically defined as gradual increases in elevation at the base of a mountain range, higher hill range or an upland area. They are a transition zone between plains and low relief hills and the adjacent topographically higher mountains, hills, and uplands. Frequently foothills consist of alluvial fans, coalesced alluvial fans, and dissected plateaus.

[edit] Foothills primarily border mountains, especially those which are reached through low ridges that increase in size closer and closer to the mountain, but can also border uplands and higher hills.

[edit] Foothills of Prospect Hill, New South Wales, Australia Areas where foothills exist, or areas commonly referred to as the foothills, include the: Appalachian foothills in Western North Carolina and Northwestern South Carolina, USA Sierra Nevada foothills of California, USA Foothills of the San Gabriel Valley in Los Angeles County, California, USA Rocky Mountain Foothills in British Columbia, Colorado, and Alberta, Canada Silesian Foothills in Silesia, Poland Black Mountains in the North Caucasus, Russia Sivalik Hills along the Himalayas in the Indian subcontinent Catalina Foothills near Tucson, Arizona, USA Margalla hills near the Himalayas in Pakistan The Duars, Chos and Terai on the foothills of Himalayas (India) The foothills around Boise in Idaho, USA The foothills of the Dandenong Ranges in Melbourne, Australia. Generally the area from Ferntree Gully/Boronia/The Basin through to Belgrave The foothills of the Blue Mountains in Sydney, Australia The foothills of the Southern Alps in Mid-Canterbury, New Zealand The Judean Foothills between the Judean Mountains and Mediterranean Coastline in Israel The Satsop Hills of the Olympic Mountains in Washington State

[edit] Another word for a foothill region is "piedmont", derived from "foot of the mount" in Romance languages. The Piedmont region of Italy lies in the foothills of the Alps, and several other foothills in other parts of the world are called "piedmont", and include: The piedmont of the United States which consists of the eastern foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. Ecosystems of piedmonts (foothills) are often known as submontane zones, relating to the higher montane ecosystems.