Physiographic regions of Kentucky USGS PP1151h-fig18

The Knobs Region or ''The Knobs'' is located in the US state of

Kentucky Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virgini ...

. It is a narrow, arc-shaped region consisting of hundreds of

isolated hill An inselberg or monadnock () is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain. In Southern Africa a similar formation of granite is known as a koppie ...

s. The region wraps around the southern and eastern parts of the Bluegrass region in the north central to northeastern part of the state. The western end of the Knobs region begins near

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana borde ...

and continues southeastward through Bullitt, Hardin, Nelson, LaRue, Marion, Taylor, Boyle, Casey and Lincoln counties before turning northeast and running along the Pottsville Escarpment and the

Appalachian Plateau The Appalachian Plateau is a series of rugged dissected plateaus located on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains. The Appalachian Mountains are a mountain range that run down the Eastern United States. The Appalachian Plateau is the no ...

. The Knob arc has a length of .The Kleber, John E., ed., ''Kentucky Encyclopedia'', University Press of Kentucky, 1992, pp. 521-2 Many of the hills are conical and up to several hundred feet high, some with capstones that form cliffs. The monadnocks formed from the eroding margins of the Pennyroyal Plateau to the south and the

Cumberland Plateau The Cumberland Plateau is the southern part of the Appalachian Plateau in the Appalachian Mountains of the United States. It includes much of eastern Kentucky and Tennessee, and portions of northern Alabama and northwest Georgia. The terms " All ...

to the east. The caprock is

Mississippian Mississippian may refer to: * Mississippian (geology), a subperiod of the Carboniferous period in the geologic timescale, roughly 360 to 325 million years ago *Mississippian culture, a culture of Native American mound-builders from 900 to 1500 AD ...

Harrodsburg Limestone and the slopes are

Borden Formation The Mississippian Borden Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, West Virginia,Matchen, D.L., and Kammer, T.W., 1994, Sequence stratigraphy of the Lower Mississippian Price and Borden Formations in southern West ...

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especia ...

s of

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the Silurian, million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Carboniferous, Mya. It is named after Devon, England, w ...

to Mississippian age.The Knobs Region, Kentucky Geological Survey
/ref>Newell, Wayne L., ''USGS Professional Paper 1151-H: The Geology of Kentucky: Physiography'', USGS, 2001

References

External links

Topomap of knobs
Regions of Kentucky Geography of Jefferson County, Kentucky Geography of Bullitt County, Kentucky Geography of Hardin County, Kentucky Geography of Nelson County, Kentucky Geography of LaRue County, Kentucky Geography of Marion County, Kentucky Geography of Taylor County, Kentucky Geography of Casey County, Kentucky Geography of Lincoln County, Kentucky {{LouisvilleMSA-stub

See also

References

External links