Tierra Helada (Spanish for "frozen land"), also known as Tierra Nevada (Spanish for "snowy land"), is a term used in Latin America to refer to the highest places found within the

Andes The Andes ( ), Andes Mountains or Andean Mountain Range (; ) are the List of longest mountain chains on Earth, longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range ...

mountains. The ''Tierra Helada'' comprises the

montane grasslands and shrublands Montane grasslands and shrublands are a biome defined by the World Wildlife Fund. The biome includes high elevation grasslands and shrublands around the world. The term "montane" in the name of the biome refers to "high elevation", rather than t ...

, sunis, punas and

páramo Páramo () may refer to a variety of alpine tundra ecosystems located in the Andes Mountain Range, South America. Some ecologists describe the páramo broadly as "all high, tropical, montane vegetation above the continuous timberline". A narrower ...

s between the

tree line The tree line is the edge of a habitat at which trees are capable of growing and beyond which they are not. It is found at high elevations and high latitudes. Beyond the tree line, trees cannot tolerate the environmental conditions (usually low ...

and the

snow line The climatic snow line is the boundary between a snow-covered and snow-free surface. The actual snow line may adjust seasonally, and be either significantly higher in elevation, or lower. The permanent snow line is the level above which snow wil ...

. The term ''tierra helada'' is accurate from a climatological standpoint, as its land is indeed "frozen", situated above the snow line. In the northern Andes, the latter is located at an altitude of approximately 15,000 ft (or about 4,500 m).Zech, W. and Hintermaier-Erhard, G. (2002); Böden der Welt – Ein Bildatlas, Heidelberg, p. 98. The Peruvian geographer Javier Pulgar Vidal ( Altitudinal zonation) used following altitudes: * as the border between the tropical rainforest and the subtropical cloud forest * m as the end of the subtropical cloud forest ('' Yunga fluvial'') * m as the tree line * m as the puna endPulgar Vidal, Javier: Geografía del Perú; Las Ocho Regiones Naturales del Perú. Edit. Universo S.A., Lima 1979. First Edition (his dissertation of 1940): Las ocho regiones naturales del Perú, Boletín del Museo de historia natural „Javier Prado", n° especial, Lima, 1941, 17, pp. 145-161.

References

Altitudinal life zones of Peru Climate of South America Geography of Mesoamerica Spanish words and phrases Geography of South America Montane ecology {{ecoregion-stub

See also

References