Eastern side of the Ural mountains. Mountains of the Chelyabinsk region: list, names, height

where are Ural mountains? and got the best answer

Answer from Vakhit Shavaliyev[guru]
The Ural Mountains are located in Eurasia. The conditional border between Europe and Asia runs along the eastern foot of the Ural Mountains.
The Ural Mountains are a mountain system between the East European and West Siberian plains. The length is more than 2000 (with Pai-Khoi and Mugodzhary - more than 2500) km, the width is from 40 to 150 km.
In a narrow strip, almost meridional, for more than 2000 km, the Ural Mountains stretch from the Arctic seas to the sultry steppes of Kazakhstan.
The territory of the Urals is located between the great rivers Volga - Kama and Ob - Irtysh. From west to east, the Urals are conditionally divided into three parts.
The first part is the Western Urals, or Cis-Urals, Cis-Urals. Here the western foothills of the Ural Mountains gradually pass into the Russian Plain.
The second part is the Ural Range, or the Ural Mountains. The Ural Range from north to south is divided into Polar, Subpolar, Northern, Middle and Southern.
The third part is the Trans-Urals. The eastern slope of the Ural Range breaks off with a ledge into the West Siberian Lowland.
The Ural Range, stretching for more than 2,000 km, begins beyond the Arctic Circle, and its southern spurs end in Central Asia. It crosses the tundra, taiga, forest-steppe and steppe. Here are the sources of the rivers of the Volga and Ob basins.

Answer from IFRA[guru]
Mountain system between the East European and West Siberian plains.

Answer from Yergey Sviridov[guru]
In Russia. Between Asia and Europe.

Answer from Author[guru]
Between the Alps and the Carpathians Not far from Elbrus there is also Everest not far

Answer from Ildar Akhmadullin[active]
... look at the globe of Russia ...

Answer from Striped giraffe Alik[guru]
You won't believe... In the Urals.

Answer from Ivan Krotov[newbie]
In the Urals

Answer from Iryna Petrak[active]
in Eurasia in the Urals!!!

Answer from Alisher begmatov[newbie]
between Asia and Europe

Answer from 3 answers[guru]

Hey! Here is a selection of topics with answers to your question: where are the Ural Mountains?

1 in what tales of Bazhov is it told about sysert? 2 where is the copper mountain and what do you know about it that gives tanya
1. In what tales of Bazhov is it told about Sysert?
Sysert is mentioned in the following tales.

The Urals stretched in the meridional direction for 2000 km from north to south - from the Arctic islands of Novaya Zemlya to the sun-scorched deserts of the Turan Plain. A conditional geographical border between Europe and Asia is drawn along the Cis-Urals. The Ural Mountains are located in the inland boundary zone of the earth's crust between the ancient Russian platform and the young West Siberian plate. The folds of the earth's crust lying in the bases of the Ural Mountains were formed during the Hercynian orogeny. Mountain building was accompanied by intensive processes of volcanism and metamorphism of rocks, therefore, numerous minerals were formed in the depths of the Urals - ores of iron, polymetals, aluminum, gold, platinum. Then for a long time - in the Mesozoic and Paleogene - there were processes of destruction and alignment of the Hercynian mountains. Gradually, the mountains fell and turned into a hilly hill. In the Neogene-Quaternary time, the ancient folded structures lying at its base split into blocks that rose to different heights. Thus, the former folded mountains turned into folded-blocky ones. There was a rejuvenation of the ancient destroyed mountains. Nevertheless, the modern ranges of the Urals are predominantly low. In the north and south, they rise to 800-1000 m. The highest peak of the Urals is Mount Narodnaya (1894 m). In the middle part, the height of the ridges does not exceed 400-500 m. Railways pass through the low passes of this part of the Urals, along which trains move between the European and Asian parts of Russia.

Uneven uplift of blocks of the earth's crust led to differences in the height of mountain ranges, their external forms. According to the features of the relief, the Urals is divided into several parts. The Polar Urals are stretched by four ridges, gradually rising from the Pai-Khoi hills to 1500 m. The ridges of the Subpolar Urals have many sharp peaks. The Northern Urals consists of two elongated parallel ridges that rise up to 800-1000 m. The western of these two ridges has flat tops. The eastern slope of the Urals abruptly breaks off towards the West Siberian lowland. The Middle Urals is the lowest part of the entire Urals: heights of about 500 m dominate. However, individual peaks rise up to 800 m here too. The Southern Urals is the widest, with predominance of foothill plateaus. Mountain tops are often flat.

The distribution of minerals in the Urals is determined by the peculiarities of its geological structure. In the west, in the Cis-Ural trough, sedimentary strata of limestone, gypsum, and clay accumulated, which are associated with significant deposits of oil, potassium salts, and coal. In the central part of the Urals, metamorphic rocks of the inner folds of the mountains appeared on the surface - gneisses, quartzites and shales, broken by tectonic faults. Igneous rocks intruded along the faults led to the formation of ore minerals. Among them essential role belongs to the ores of iron, polymetals, aluminum. During the years of the first five-year plans, a large iron ore plant and the city of Magnitogorsk were built on the basis of iron ore deposits. The eastern slope of the Urals is composed of various geological rocks - sedimentary, metamorphic and volcanic, and therefore the minerals are very diverse. These are ores of iron, non-ferrous metals, aluminum, deposits of gold and silver, precious and semi-precious stones, asbestos.

The Urals is a climate divide between the temperate continental climate of the East European Plain and the continental climate of Western Siberia. Despite their relatively low height, the Ural Mountains have an impact on the climate of our country. Throughout the year, moist air masses penetrate the Urals, brought by cyclones from Atlantic Ocean. When air rises along the western slope, the amount of precipitation increases. The lowering of air along the eastern slope is accompanied by its drying. Therefore, 1.5-2 times less precipitation falls on the eastern slopes of the Ural Mountains than on the western ones. The western and eastern slopes differ both in temperature and in the nature of the weather. Average January temperatures vary from -22° in the north to -16° C in the south. On the western slope, winters are relatively mild and snowy. Little snow falls on the eastern slope, and frosts can reach -45 ° C. Summer is cool and rainy in the north, warm in most of the Urals, and hot and dry in the south.

Many rivers originate in the Urals. The largest among them flow to the west. These are Pechora, Kama, Belaya, Ufa. The Ishim flows to the east, the Urals to the south. On the meridional sections, the rivers flow calmly along wide valleys in the basins between the ridges. On latitudinal segments, they swiftly rush across the ridges along tectonic faults along narrow rocky gorges with many rapids. The alternation of narrow gorges and wide sections of valleys gives the rivers an amazing variety and beauty, favors the construction of reservoirs. In the Urals, the need for water is very high, which is needed in large quantities for numerous industrial enterprises and cities. However, many rivers are heavily polluted sewage industries and cities and need to be cleaned up. Great and varied economic importance the rivers of the Urals and the Urals, although their role in shipping and energy is not so great. Hydropower reserves of the Ural rivers are below the national average. The average annual capacity of the middle rivers of the Urals is about 3.5 million kW. The Kama basin is richest in hydropower. A number of large hydroelectric power plants have been built here. Among them are Kamskaya and Votkinskaya HPPs. The largest reservoir of the Kamskaya HPP stretches for 220 km. A hydroelectric power station of significant capacity was built on the river. Ufa. Despite the abundance of Ural rivers, only a few of them are suitable for navigation. This is primarily Kama, Belaya, Ufa. In the Trans-Urals, ships sail along the Tobol, Tavda, and in the high waters along Sosva, Lozva and Tura. For shallow-draft vessels, the Urals are also navigable below the city of Orenburg.

To improve water supply, ponds and reservoirs have long been built on the rivers of the Urals. These are Verkhne-Isetsky and city ponds in Yekaterinburg, Nizhne-Tagilsky and others. Reservoirs have also been created: Volchikhinsky on Chusovaya, Magnitogorsky and Iriklinsky in the Urals.

For industrial, agricultural purposes, recreation and tourism, numerous lakes are used, of which there are more than 6 thousand lakes.

Ural crosses several natural areas. Along its peaks and upper parts of the slopes, they are shifted to the south. Mountain tundras are common in the Polar Urals. To the south, on the western slopes, under conditions of high moisture, dark coniferous spruce-fir forests dominate, along the eastern slopes - pine and cedar forests. In the Southern Urals on the western slope - coniferous broadleaf forests, to the south they are replaced by lime and oak forest-steppe. On the eastern slope of the Southern Urals there is a birch-aspen forest-steppe. In the extreme south of the Urals and in the low mountains of Mugodzhary, there are dry steppes and semi-deserts.

They are a mountain system connecting the East European and West Siberian plains. The rows, which are located in parallel, form a certain set of mountain peaks, which is called the Ural Range. Geographically, the Ural Range originates from Novaya Zemlya, extends to the Kara Sea and reaches the Ural-Caspian semi-deserts. It is impossible to observe a uniform picture over the entire length of the ridge. Therefore, this natural phenomenon is rightfully considered unique in its kind. The eastern side of the Ural Mountains became the border between two states, namely between Europe and Asia.

Mountains are considered the oldest around the globe. Each stone carries the burden of history, because it was they who saw the birth of the Earth, the development of civilizations and are silent about those mysteries that have not yet been able to figure out to man. The proof of this great silence are the remains of some stones.

List of mountain peaks of the Chelyabinsk region

The great secret of being is kept in the mountains in Chelyabinsk region. The list looks like this:

• (843 m).
• Big Stone.
• Merry Mountain (750.5 m).
• Second Stone (761.9 m).
• The second hill (1198.9 m).
• Glinka (1065.1 m).
• Naked hill (1175 m).
• Naked Cone (945.5 m).
• Dedurich.
• (724.5 m).
• Evgrafovsky mountains.
• Mount Elaudy (1116 m).
• Pencil (610.9 m).
• Karatash (947.7 m);
• Leaf Mountain (630 m).
• Bear Mountain (797 m).
• Yurma (1003 m).

This is not a complete list of the Chelyabinsk region. The main ones will be presented in this article.

The formation of the Ural ranges

In the eastern side of the Ural Mountains there is a small hillock. Here you can observe the famous Karagay Mountains and the Kuibas Upland. It is these objects that all children study in geography lessons, but, of course, it is much more interesting to see all this majesty live.

Mountains of the Chelyabinsk region western region composed of rocks such as limestone and other very soft rock minerals. The mountains of the western region are rich in all kinds of karst formations. In these places you can observe small funnels and even large caves. These formations appeared thanks to water, it was she who paved these paths in soft limestone rocks. On the banks of the river there is a wonderful miracle of nature - cliffs that are washed by water and blown by the wind. Thanks to this exposure, the breeds have acquired funny shapes, which attracts the attention of people. The height of these cliffs can reach 100 m.

The highest mountain in the Chelyabinsk region

The highest mountain in the Chelyabinsk region is the top of the mountain Peak is called Big Nurgush. The height of the mountain is 1406 m.

In addition to the most in the Chelyabinsk region, there is also the longest ridge - Urenga. Its length is 65 kilometers. In addition, there are 10 peaks on the ridge, the height of which reaches 1000 meters.

Mount Pencil

Surprising is the fact that the oldest mountain on the entire planet, which has the funny name Pencil, is located in the Chelyabinsk region. It is located in the Kusinsky district. For many, this fact is surprising. Chelyabinsk is really a discovery in this area.

Pencil - the oldest mountain in the world

Scientists conducted a large number of studies and came to the conclusion that Mount Pencil (Chelyabinsk region) has an age of more than 4.2 billion years. For example: when compared with the age of the Earth, which is 4.6 billion years old, the mountain is really considered the oldest.

Naturally, at the beginning of its existence, the mountain was much higher. Such a huge amount of time, water, winds, sun, after all, production played a role. The mountain has become much lower, now its height is only 610 meters. Of course, it is a great success that Mount Pencil (Chelyabinsk region) has survived to our times and scientists have the opportunity to study its age. After all, most of the mountains of the same age have long been destroyed, and there is no trace of them.

Unique rocks

The mountain itself is made of incredibly rare and ancient stone. It is impossible to meet this breed in other parts of the globe, so the area is unique in its kind. The composition of the rock resembles the Earth's mantle; it is very difficult to meet such a phenomenon. Another interesting fact is that there is no organic matter in the composition, this phenomenon is inherent only in this mountain, therefore it is sometimes considered cosmic. This mountain has become a silent witness to all the events that the long-suffering planet Earth had to endure.

It is also surprising that most residents of the city of Chelyabinsk do not even suspect that they live next to such a monument of nature and history. And even more so, most of the inhabitants of Russia do not know about such a miracle of nature. But information about this mountain is available to everyone, scientists have published all the studies and scientific articles.
Climbing Mount Pencil is a great happiness, because from its height an incredible view opens up, where you can observe other mountains and ranges, the spectacle is worth attention.

Interestingly, there are several versions of the oldest mountains in the world. But most scientists agreed on the Ural Mountains, and it was this version that was accepted as official for everyone. That is why they teach it in schools. Inhabitants Ancient Russia considered the Ural Mountains to be an ordinary stone, and so they called them. Not so long ago, similar mountains were found in Canada, which in their age practically correspond to Mount Pencil. Canadian scientists hurried to a conclusion and made their peaks the most ancient in the world, but this is their deep delusion.

Mount Cherry

The top of this mountain is also located in the Chelyabinsk region. Namely, in a small village called Vishnevogorsk. The population of the town is small - about 5 thousand people. The northern peak of the mountain is called Karavay. It is located directly in the city. At the foot of the mountain there are mines and adits.
Gorgeous lakes formed in the quarries of the mountain. The only negative phenomenon was that some industries began to use these lakes for waste disposal, which has a very negative impact on the environmental situation. IN winter period on the slopes of the mountain there is a ski resort where you can have a great time.

Mountain Cherry got its name thanks to the wild cherry tree growing at its foot. A huge number of berries are harvested here every year.

Mount Yurma

Mount Yurma (Chelyabinsk region) is located in the northern part of the Southern Urals. Its height is 1003 meters. Some decline can be observed in this part of the central park. The mountain borders on a hilly terrain northeast region Chelyabinsk region. The low mountains are characterized by the presence of flat-topped mounds, which are separated by valleys. On the southern slope, Mount Yurma is connected to the northern part of the Big Taganay by the Big Log. Here you can also find mixed forests. Among the trees, maple, linden and mountain elm predominate.

Previously, only broad-leaved forests grew in these places, but today they are replaced by fir taiga.

From the Bashkir language, Yurma is translated as "do not go." This is a kind of warning that climbing a mountain can be dangerous.

High humidity prevails in these places, which forms condensate, as a result of which numerous clouds gather in the valley at dawn.

The mountains of the Chelyabinsk region are unique natural monuments that keep the history of not only Russia, but the entire planet.

Journey to the Cis-Urals and to the western slope of the Ural Mountains was made by schoolchildren of the geographical club "Raimantau" in the first ten days of August. Within the framework of the grant project of the Russian geographical society"From Ik to Yaik" the guys visited the geographical sights of the capital of Bashkortostan - Ufa, the single mountains Malaya and Bolshaya Zmeinye, Shalashovskaya and Kiselevskaya caves.

A large-scale research expedition of Bashkir schoolchildren "From Ik to Yaik" is carried out with the grant support of the Russian Geographical Society. During the year, the children will have to cross the Republic of Bashkortostan from west to east, from the Ik River to the Ural River (the old name is Yaik).

Project objectives:

• study of changes in the landscapes of Bashkortostan;
• expeditionary research along four routes;
• practical study of geography in field conditions;
• accumulation geographical knowledge about the native land;
• carrying out ecological observations and drawing the attention of the population to the problems of environmental protection;
• organization of active and educational recreation for schoolchildren;
• promotion among young people of a healthy lifestyle and travel around their native land.

The end point of the Pre-Ural route was the city of Asha, located in the Chelyabinsk region, on the border with Bashkortostan. On the way to it, making a transfer to the train in Ufa, young travelers decided to get acquainted with the geography largest city Bashkiria. Their first object was the Museum of Geology and Minerals, in the showcases of which more than three thousand samples of rocks and minerals are collected. By visiting the museum you can get an idea of ​​the richest mineral wealth Bashkortostan, due to the difference in the geological structure: West Side Republic has a platform structure, and the eastern one is folded. In the west there are large deposits of oil, gas, coal, rock salt, and in the east - iron ore, zinc, copper and gold. The children most of all liked the most colorful department - "Colored Stones and Minerals", which represents the richest collection of South Ural jaspers. In the museum you can take a picture next to the map of Bashkiria, made of ornamental and semi-precious stones from various deposits of the republic.

After visiting the museum, the expedition members went to the Dudkinskaya ferry across the Ufa River. Previously, there was a busy place here - the Siberian Highway began, and now a boat transports only summer residents through the crossing. Nearby, in the high forested coastal slope of Ufimka, there is the Dudkinskaya adit.

On the way to it, the expedition members examined a section of Permian rocks that make up the Ufa Peninsula - a hilly area between the Belaya and Ufa rivers. The Dudka gypsum mine was developed from the 1920s to the fifties. It is a complex 2500-meter labyrinth of drifts with a vault height of up to 4 meters. In places in the roof you can see natural karst cavities, and not far from the adit, the guys found several karst sinkholes.

Karst processes caused by the dissolution of gypsum with water are one of the main problems of Ufa. Over the past hundred years, more than three hundred karst failures have been recorded on the Ufa Peninsula. In Ufa, cracks often form in houses due to ground movements. The walls of some buildings are pulled together with metal belts, and several high-rise buildings had to be dismantled.

After admiring the coast of the Ufa River and climbing a narrow serpentine, the expedition members went to the city center. Their next goal is to search for the house where the famous polar navigator lived Valerian Ivanovich Albanov, who was born on May 26, 1882 in Ufa, and in 1904 he graduated from the St. Petersburg School long-distance navigation. In 1912, he was invited as a navigator to the expedition of Georgy Brusilov on the schooner "Saint Anna", the purpose of which was to pass the Northern Sea Route.

Off the western coast of Yamal, the ship was jammed with ice and began its two-year drift in a north-westerly direction. On April 10, 1914, due to the threat of starvation, part of the crew - 11 people led by the navigator Albanov - left the schooner.

Four months later, only two participants in the transition - Albanov and sailor Konrad managed to break through the hummocky ice and wide open waters to the Franz Josef Land archipelago, the rest died. The fate of the crew that remained on the St. Anna is still unknown. The materials of the Brusilov expedition delivered by Albanov became an important contribution to the geography of the Arctic Ocean, and the navigator's book "To the South, to Franz Josef Land" aroused great interest among readers in Russia and abroad. Valerian Albanov and the schooner "Saint Anna" served as prototypes for navigator Ivan Klimov and the ship "Saint Maria" in Veniamin Kaverin's novel "Two Captains".

And now, the expedition members are on Aksakov Street, near the walls of a one-story house that does not have a number. Having entered a small grocery store on the right side of the building, they found out that this is the same house number 6, in which, as confirmed by Ufa local historians, the famous polar navigator spent his childhood. Unfortunately, there is no plaque about Valerian Albanov on the house, the house does not have the status of a historical and architectural monument and, therefore, can be demolished, like many old houses in the center of Ufa.

The next point of the expedition was the Malaya and Bolshaya Zmeinaya mountains, located next to the Sim River, on the border with the Chelyabinsk region. These lone mountains owe their origin to the ancient Perm Sea, which washed the western slopes of the then young Urals, and are fossil reefs (coral islands) that arose about 300 million years ago.

The most famous Permian reefs are the Sterlitamak shikhans. But there are others in Bashkortostan that are less famous and unexplored. These include the Snake Mountains, located just 70 kilometers east of Ufa. From the Serpentine Mountains, a panorama of the advanced Ural Ranges opens, in front of which, within the city of Asha, another reef mass rises - Lipovaya Gora, a natural monument of the Chelyabinsk region.

On Mount Malaya Zmeinaya there is a quarry for the extraction of building stone. The expedition members applied to the administration of the enterprise with a request for permission to visit the quarry in order to search for samples of fossil fauna on its territory (explosive work is underway in the quarry). They received permission to explore and an accompanying mountain foreman. Within a few hours, the guys discovered ancient fossils: brachiopods, ammonoids, sea lilies, sponges and corallites. The collected samples of fossil organisms of the early Permian sea basin will become exhibits of the school geographical cabinet-museum. The expedition members also visited Mount Bolshaya Zmeinaya, 280 meters high, the slope of which descends steeply to the Sim River. The mountain, covered with linden forest, remains untouched by human activity. Perhaps it should be preserved as a natural monument?

Sedimentary rocks predominate on the western slopes of the Southern Urals - limestones, dolomites and marls. They are easily soluble in water, and therefore hundreds of caves are located here. The expedition members visited the Kiselevskaya and Shalashovskaya caves, located near the city of Asha. The narrow mountain valley of the Sim River opening outside the city with steep cliffs, from which railway avalanches come down in winter, and in summer rockfalls are figuratively called "Gates of the Urals".

To get to the Kiselyovskaya cave, you need to climb the steep path up the Kiselevskaya ravine. The entrance to the cave is an inclined well, which you need to descend carefully, but it is better to use rope insurance. The length of the cave is 1260 meters, its largest grotto, the Banquet Hall, reaches a length of more than 100 meters, a width of up to 40, and a ceiling height of 10 meters. The floor in the cave is covered with blocks of limestone, there are many clay areas. In the cave, the guys observed a variety of sinter formations: stalactites, stalagmites, scallops, snow-white calcite streaks, cave pearls.

The entrance to the Shalashovskaya cave is located at the end of a blind karst ravine at the bottom of a large sinkhole, the inlet of which is 10 meters wide and 1.5 meters high. Entering it, the guys crawled through a low passage and ended up in the main gallery, along which a small stream runs, forming small erosion pots filled with water under two-meter ledges. In the main gallery there are small grottoes, the walls and vaults of which are covered with bluish-white sintered calcite formations. The total length of the passages of the Shalashovskaya cave is 225 meters.

After spending the night in the forest near the Shalashovskaya cave, the members of the expedition "From Ik to Yaik" went by train home from Chelyabinsk Asha, located on the eastern border of Bashkortostan, to Tuymazy, located at the western borders of the republic.

The material was prepared by the head of the expedition, geography teacher I.M. Danilko

Cis-Ural marginal foredeep with relatively gentle sedimentation in the western side and more complex in the eastern side;

The zone of the western slope of the Urals with the development of intensely crumpled and thrust-disturbed sedimentary strata of the Lower and Middle Paleozoic;

the Central Ural uplift, where among the sedimentary strata of the Paleozoic and Upper Precambrian, older crystalline rocks of the edge of the East European Platform outcrop in places;

The system of troughs-synclinoria of the eastern slope (the largest are Magnitogorsk and Tagil), made mainly by Middle Paleozoic volcanic strata and marine, often deep-sea sediments, as well as deep-seated igneous rocks (gabbroids, granitoids, less often alkaline intrusions) that break through them - the so-called. greenstone belt of the Urals;

Ural-Tobolsk anticlinorium with outcrops of older metamorphic rocks and wide development of granitoids;

East Ural synclinorium, in many respects similar to Tagil-Magnitogorsk.

At the base first three zones according to geophysical data, the ancient, Early Precambrian, basement is confidently traced, composed mainly of metamorphic and igneous rocks and formed as a result of several epochs of folding. The oldest, presumably Archean, rocks come to the surface in the Taratash ledge on the western slope of the Southern Urals. Pre-Ordovician rocks in the basement of the synclinories of the eastern slope of the Urals are unknown. It is assumed that the Paleozoic volcanic strata of synclinoria are based on thick plates of hypermafic and gabbroids, which in some places come to the surface in the massifs of the Platinum-bearing belt and other related belts; these plates, possibly, are outcasts of the ancient oceanic bed of the Ural geosyncline. In the east, in the Ural-Tobolsk anticlinorium, outcrops of Precambrian rocks are rather problematic.

The Paleozoic deposits of the western slope of the Urals are represented by limestones, dolomites, and sandstones formed in conditions of predominantly shallow seas. To the east, deeper sediments of the continental slope are traced in a discontinuous band. Further east, within the eastern slope of the Urals, the Paleozoic (Ordovician, Silurian) section begins with altered volcanic rocks of basalt composition and jasper, comparable to the rocks of the bottom of modern oceans. In places above the section, there are thick, also altered spilite-natro-liparitic strata with deposits of copper pyrite ores. Younger deposits of the Devonian and partly Silurian are represented mainly by andesite-basalt, andesite-dacitic volcanic rocks and greywackes, which correspond to the stage in the development of the eastern slope of the Urals when the oceanic Earth's crust was replaced by a transitional bark. Carboniferous deposits (limestones, grey-wackes, acidic and alkaline volcanics) are associated with the latest, continental stage of development of the eastern slope of the Urals. At the same stage, the bulk of the Paleozoic, essentially potassium, granites of the Urals, which formed pegmatite veins with rare valuable minerals, also intruded.

In the Late Carboniferous-Permian, sedimentation on the eastern slope of the Urals almost stopped and a folded mountain structure formed here; on the western slope at that time, the Cis-Ural marginal trough was formed, filled with a thick (up to 4-5 km) strata of detrital rocks that were carried down from the Urals - molasse. Triassic deposits have been preserved in a number of graben depressions, the occurrence of which in the north and east of the Urals was preceded by basalt (trap) magmatism. Younger strata of Mesozoic and Cenozoic platform deposits gently overlap folded structures along the periphery of the Urals.

It is assumed that the Paleozoic structure of the Urals was laid down in the Late Cambrian - Ordovician as a result of the splitting of the Late Precambrian continent and the expansion of its fragments, as a result of which a geosynclinal depression was formed with crust and oceanic-type sediments in its inner part. Subsequently, the expansion was replaced by compression, and the oceanic basin began to gradually close and “overgrow” with the newly formed continental crust; the nature of magmatism and sedimentation changed accordingly. modern structure The Urals bear traces of the strongest compression, accompanied by a strong transverse contraction of the geosynclinal depression and the formation of gentle scaly thrusts - ridges.

The Urals is a whole system of mountain ranges, stretched parallel to one another in the meridional direction. As a rule, there are two or three such parallel ridges, but in some places, with the expansion of the mountain system, their number increases to four or more. So, for example, the Southern Urals is orographically very complex between 55 0 and 54 ° N. sh., where there are at least six ridges. Between the ridges lie vast depressions occupied by river valleys.

The orography of the Urals is closely related to its tectonic structure. Most often, ridges and ridges are confined to anticlinal zones, and depressions - to synclinal ones. Inverted relief is less common, associated with the presence of rocks more resistant to destruction in synclinal zones than in adjacent anticlinal zones. Such a character has, for example, the Zilair plateau, or the South Ural plateau, within the Zilair synclinorium.

Lower areas are replaced in the Urals by elevated ones - a kind of mountain nodes, in which the mountains reach not only their maximum heights, but also their greatest width. It is remarkable that such knots coincide with the places where the strike of the Ural mountain system changes. The main ones are Subpolar, Middle Ural and South Ural. In the Subpolar node, lying at 65 ° N. sh., Ural deviates from the south-western direction to the south. Here rises the highest peak of the Ural Mountains - Mount Narodnaya (1894 m). The Middle Urals junction is located at about 60°N. sh., where the strike of the Urals changes from south to southeast. Among the peaks of this knot, Mount Konzhakovsky Kamen (1569 m) stands out. The South Ural node is located between 55 0 and 54 0 s. sh. Here, the direction of the Ural ranges becomes south-western instead of south-western, and Iremel (1582 m) and Yamantau (1640 m) attract attention from the peaks.

A common feature of the relief of the Urals is the asymmetry of its western and eastern slopes. The western slope is gentle, passes into the Russian Plain more gradually than the eastern one, which steeply descends towards the West Siberian Plain. The asymmetry of the Urals is due to tectonics, the history of its geological development.

Another orographic feature of the Urals is associated with asymmetry - the displacement of the main watershed ridge, which separates the rivers of the Russian Plain from the rivers of Western Siberia, to the east, closer to West Siberian Plain. This ridge in different parts of the Urals has different names: Uraltau in the Southern Urals, Belt Stone in the Northern Urals. At the same time, it is not the highest almost everywhere; the largest peaks, as a rule, lie to the west of it. Such a hydrographic asymmetry of the Urals is the result of increased "aggressiveness" of the rivers of the western slope, caused by a sharper and faster uplift of the Cis-Urals in the Neogene compared to the Trans-Urals.

Even with a cursory glance at the hydrographic pattern of the Urals, the presence of sharp, elbow turns in most rivers on the western slope is striking. In the upper reaches of the river flow in the meridional direction, following the longitudinal intermountain depressions. Then they turn sharply to the west, sawing often high ridges, after which they again flow in the meridional direction or retain the old latitudinal direction. Such sharp turns are well expressed in Pechora, Shchugor, Ilych, Belaya, Aya, Sakmara and many others. It has been established that the rivers saw through the ridges in places where the axes of the folds are lowered. In addition, many of them, apparently, are older than mountain ranges, and their incision proceeded simultaneously with the uplift of the mountains.

A small absolute height determines the predominance of low-mountain and mid-mountain geomorphological landscapes in the Urals. The peaks of many ranges are flat, while some mountains are domed with more or less soft outlines of the slopes. In the Northern and Polar Urals, near the upper border of the forest and above it, where frosty weathering is vigorously manifested, stone seas (turmeric) are widespread. These places are also characterized by upland terraces resulting from solifluction processes and frost weathering.

Alpine landforms are extremely rare in the Ural Mountains. They are known only in the most elevated parts of the Polar and Subpolar Urals. The bulk of modern glaciers of the Urals are connected with the same mountain ranges.

"Lednichki" is not an accidental expression in relation to the glaciers of the Urals. Compared to the glaciers of the Alps and the Caucasus, the Urals look like dwarfs. All of them belong to the cirque and cirque-valley type and are located below the climatic snow boundary. The total number of glaciers in the Urals is 122, and the entire area of ​​glaciation is only slightly more than 25 km2. Most of them are in the polar watershed part of the Urals between 67 0 -68 0 s. sh. Caro-valley glaciers up to 1.5-2.2 km long have been found here. The second glacial region is located in the Subpolar Urals between 64 0 and 65 ° N. sh.

The main part of the glaciers is concentrated on the more humid western slope of the Urals. It is noteworthy that all Ural glaciers lie in cirques of eastern, southeastern, and northeastern exposures. This is explained by the fact that they are inspired, that is, they were formed as a result of the deposition of snowstorm snow in the wind shadow of mountain slopes.