page_title: Great Plains
section_title: Intermediate Great Plains
hierarchical_section_title: Great Plains / Geography / Intermediate Great Plains
caption_attribution_description: English: The Upper Niobrara River Valley at Agate Fossil Beds Nat'l Monument
context_page_description: The Great Plains is a broad expanse of flat land, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, and grassland, located in the interior of North America. It lies west of the Mississippi River tallgrass prairie in the United States and east of the Rocky Mountains in the U.S. and Canada.
  It encompasses:
  The entirety of Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota
  Parts of Colorado, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Wyoming
  The southern portions of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba
  The region is known for supporting extensive cattle ranching and dry farming. The Canadian portion of the Plains is known as the Canadian Prairies. It covers much of Alberta and southern Saskatchewan, and a narrow band of southern Manitoba.
context_section_description: In the intermediate section of the plains, between latitudes 44° and 42°, including southern South Dakota and northern Nebraska, the erosion of certain large districts is peculiarly elaborate. Known as the Badlands, it is a minutely dissected form with a relief of a few hundred feet. This is due to several causes:
  the dry climate, which prevents the growth of a grassy turf
  the fine texture of the Tertiary strata in the badland districts
  every little rill, at times of rain, carves its own little valley.
caption: Miocene epoch layers under late Pleistocene and Holocene layers Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, Nebraska
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