Carboniferous forests were prominent across Paleozoic land.
An explosion of invertebrate lifeforms began in the Paleozoic period, along with other major events that changed Earth as we know it today. During the Paleozoic period, shifting of the Earth's tectonic plates caused the formation of a super-continent, a noteworthy mountain range still seen today, some prominent interior plains and cut out bluffs along some rivers.
Pangaea
In the Paleozoic era, a super-continent formed when two mega-continents called Gondwanaland and Laurasia collided. As Pangaea formed because of the Earth's plates shifting--also known as plate tectonics--so did many of the landforms still present on the planet today. Pangaea began during the early to middle Jurassic period and lasted until the Cretaceous period, before shifting of the Earth's core caused Laurasia to rotate clockwise and move northward with North American and Eurasia.
Appalachian Mountains
Believed to be the highest mountain range around 466 mya (million years ago), the Appalachian Mountains stretch from the island of Newfoundland to central Alabama. In the earliest Paleozoic era, the Appalachians were a passive plate margin and periodically submerged beneath shallow seas. The Appalachian Mountains formed when a neighboring oceanic plate collided and began to sink beneath the North American craton (an old, stable part of a continent). This was caused when motions of the plates changed during the early Paleozoic era and began the mountain-building tectonic collisions during the Paleozoic era.
Interior Plains
During the mountain-building tectonic collisions, a low-lying region in northwest and central North America had formed called the Interior Plains. As the tectonic collisions took place along the eastern and western margins of the continent, the Interior Plains remained relatively unaffected. The Interior Plains are extensive physio-graphic divisions that include the Interior Lowland Plateaus, the Central Lowland, the Great Plains, the Manitoba Lowlands, the Prairie Grassland, the Northern Boreal Plains, the Mackenzie Delta and the Southern Boreal Plains and Plateau.
Mississippi Limestone Bluffs
As the Paleozoic era progressed, six periods of the era began and ended and influenced the evolution of lifeforms on Pangaea. During the Mississippian period--named for the rocks from the age exposed in the Mississippi River Valley today--warm shallow seas and swampy marshlands covered the majority of the lands in the Mississippian period. Many of the limestone bluffs seen today from the Mississippian era tower over rivers, having been cut away by the seas that covered them 345 to 310 mya.
Tags: Appalachian Mountains, Interior Plains, tectonic collisions, Boreal Plains, during early
