Vancouvers Landscape Portfolio

Initially, minerals formed into solid crystals, from where rocks would be formed. The boulders that characterize the current landscapes were initially non-existent. Hence, many of the existing sceneries consist of the basic rocks of metamorphic, igneous and sedimentary. The landscapes envisaged in Vancouver today are a product of displacement processes such as volcanic and glacial activities that took place in the ancient times, although many of them have taken new forms as a consequence of weathering. Analysis To effectively describe the Vancouver landscapes, it would be appropriate to discuss the early processes that led to their emergence. Basically, water may get into cracks of rocks, breaking it into pieces (artifact 5). As rocks are broken down, they create room for the formation of big boulders.

Besides, the creation of soils may also be controlled by the weathering processes, where the rocks that are broken down can form gravel. Many landscapes cannot exist without the presence of rivers. As is in the case of Vancouver, there exists rifts and valleys. Being an island, Vancouver has a coastline, which may have emanated from waves and changing landforms. The landforms may evidently have been created by the drifting of plates through the process of tectonics (artifact 7). Indeed, scientists consider that the Juan de Fuca plate could have drifted towards the north. Waves are known to have a great effect on the formation of coasts. When the wind blows over the earth's surface, water in the ocean may also create storms, and this erodes bedrocks and hence causes the movement of sediments and plates.

In the past, rock formation may have been catapulted by heat emanating from within the interior of the earth. Moreover, earthquake waves may have made the landscape to be distinct. The mountainous landscapes have also undergone processes of displacement, and this has caused basins below to be accumulated with sediments. Therefore, the architecture of Vancouver river basins is a product of rocks movement. Due to volcanic activities, rocks may melt, and subsequently cool off to form igneous granitic rocks (artifact 10). Such rocks that remained are quite difficult to be eroded due to their strong texture. In fact, such hard rocks can be found in many areas within Vancouver. Apparently, the reason as to why many of the rocks are still visible is due to their structure, which has high levels of quartz and feldspar-rich granular rocks (artifact 6).

These rocks have a characteristic component of hardness, making it difficult to be washed away. In fact, experts consider it as having been resistant to the glacier as well as river erosion. The lava that erupted from below was highly molten, and this created a hole within the glacier base, and this formed the lava that surrounded the ice. The flat-topped mountains thus became so due to a process of melting, which ensured that the rock columns maintained their current state (artifact 3). It is evident that there exist some lakes in Vancouver, whose process of formation can be reconciled to volcanic and glacial processes. Before, the formation of lakes, there existed river valleys, which did not have any water in them.

The valleys may have been filled with water due to the flow from stream waters that were dammed. The rocks types explained above dominate many of the hilly regions. Most of the coastal mountains may have emerged as a consequence of the processes of uplift, heating, stemming and compression. Current landscapes are still being shaped by erosion when flooding takes place. However, many of the significant shapes such as valleys that are U-shaped may have been formed through glacial processes. Many of the valleys can be dated back to the ice age. Landslides in Vancouver are composed of sediments which are associated with the ice age period. Even then, many of them are still being shaped by heavy rains. In essence, an observation of the river banks of Vancouver indicates that the landslides have contributed large sediments through the process of filing rivers and channels with deposits.