Cape Fold Belt

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The Cape Fold Belt ( also: Cape Fold Belt ) is a type of landscape in South Africa, resulting from the aggregation of a plurality of mountains and the provinces of Western Cape and the western section of the Eastern Cape impressed. It consists of a sequence of unfolded sedimentary rocks and covers large parts of the south-west corner of South Africa with Table Mountain sandstone.

Mountain landscapes of the Belt

The fold belt opens up behind the numerous bays and headlands of the Western Cape and captured territories, about 400 km in the north and about 500 km of the coastline of the Atlantic are as of the Indian Ocean from the Cape of Good Hope in an easterly direction in the hinterland. Along the Garden Route ( Mossel Bay to Plettenberg Bay ) of the Belt comes with the Outeniqua Mountains, the Kouga - Moutains and the Tsitsikamma mountains close to the shore. From Ostschenkel False Bay, the Hottentots Holland Mountains migrate northwards, which merge into the Boland Mountains. In the west are the Cederberg. Deeper inland wait eastward to the Langeberg Mountains and the Swartberg Mountains. With the Seweweekspoortpiek the Belt achieved in the Swartberg its highest elevation ( 2325 m).

Geology

The fold belt is composed of Table Mountain sandstone, that is of a sedimentary sequence of different quartzitic sandstones and shales. It extends from Nieuwoudtville on the Table Mountain region near Cape Town to the tip of the Cape Peninsula and in the region of the distant Port Elizabeth. Within lithostratigraphic relationships South Africa the Cape fold belt is part of the Table Mountain Group, which is assigned to the middle Paleozoic in their ages and is considered part of the Cape Supergroup.

Today's rocks of the belt have their origin in the geological age of the Ordovician, a chronostratigraphic system of the Paleozoic. In this phase, there was a discordant Successive superposition of rock strata. Superimposed on this were fine clastic sedimentary rocks such as mudstones and siltstones and greywacke of the older Malmesbury Group. During the Carboniferous and Permian of the subsequent unfolding of the continued and led to the merger of the supercontinent Pangaea.

Orogeny ( age of Karoo Supergroup )

The mountains of the Cape Belts, despite their appearance they convey, not particularly old. They were among the collision forces in the formation of the supercontinent Pangaea about 300 million years ago during the Permian. Its structure is very weather resistant due to quartz-bearing sandstone and clayey shale formations. Alluvial soils to the sea shores and river and lake shores crowded during the Quaternary on the resulting ( low cut ) valleys.

Before 300-200 million years ago formed the Karoo Supergroup. Sedimentary formations within this supergroup started in the Carboniferous with the glacial deposits of the Dwyka Group ( Dwyka tillites - ). Massive folding movements were in favor of the cause. Marine sediments were deposited over it. About this layers superimposed fluvial sediments. These overlays initially gave the Ecca and later the Beaufort Group. The sedimentary sequences exposed on the Beaufort Group are open to the elements. They break easily and form only small powerful soils of sands and silts. Intensive land use reinforced this development and it entanden gullies ( gullies ). Due to soil erosion valuable ecosystems and agricultural land will be destroyed. In addition, the flushed away by surface water soil pollutes the river with large quantities of mineral Schwebstoffeinträgen, can make the dams and other water management facilities inoperable. Important discovered fossil reptile species in this group are Cistecephalus ( Dicynodontia ) Cynognathus, Eodicynodon, Lystrosaurus, Pristerognathus, Procolophon, Tapinocephalus and Tropidostoma.

Last covered violent lava flows of the Drakensberg Formation the existing sediments, so that ultimately sediment layers superimposed on layers of sediment and thereby compressed. Through the disintegration of Gondwana rose last on violent magma and volcanism began. Temperature extremes, emerged. Likewise, extremely was the pressure on the rock material, so that the overlapping layers of sediment were solidified enormously to twisted and anticline formed. Even today, witnessed the landscape of the Cape fold belt, these processes sometimes in spectacular fashion.

It is striking that these sedimentary structures often run parallel to the coastline, which is due to the fact that during the Jurassic, before about 120 million years ago, by the breakup of the ancient supercontinent Gondwana in the African and South American continental mass, enormous frictional forces along their course of direction occurred. Today's Patagonia was by then west from the present-day Cape Town and the Falkland islands south of it. With the lowering of the continental crust at the two oceans, the Karoo Super Group completed in the time of the overcut of Jura from to chalk.

Landscapes of the Cape fold belt

• Cederberg
• Olifants River Mountains
• Piketberg ( Piketberg )
• Winterhoekberge
• Skurweberge
• Hex River Mountains
• You Toitskloof Mountains
• Drakenstein Mountains ( Drakenstein )
• Simonsberg
• Hottentots - Holland Mountains
• Kogelberg
• Stettynsberge
• Langenberg
• Riviersonderend Mountains
• Kleinrivier Mountains
• Witte mountains
• Swartberg
• Outeniqua Mountains Mountains
• Langkloof Mountains
• Kouga Mountains
• Tsitsikamma Mountains
• Baviaanskloof
• Zuurberge

Climate

The climate of the Cape Fold Mountains is subtropical Mediterranean, with rainy winters, which can be eastward determine peak rainy season to early spring and late autumn. At the height of Port Elizabeth on the eastern edge of the belt is uniform all-season rainfall to be measured. Up to 2500 mm of rainfall are not expected for the annual average. Westward decrease the rainfall in the coastal area, as the Outeniqua and Tsitsikamma Mountains act as a weather divide. There, falling on average a maximum of 750 mm of rain in the area. Inland (especially in the west of the Belt ) to reduce the amount of precipitation at 400 mm per year.

The water drains are oligotrophic. Few nutrients are bound in what only allows low organic production. Due to this fact the geomorphological conditions, which will bear the Table Mountain sandstone. The clear but often acidic water has pH values ​​of 4.3. Then indicate the vegetation formations, often exhaust themselves in sclerophyllous and heathland.

Fauna / Flora

The relatively acidic waters of the Cape Fold mountain range does not allow biodiversity in the waters. Endemic carp fish, galaxies, two types of Cape bush fishing and a number of representatives of the genus Barbus. Isolation processes have resulted in the genus to allopatric speciation Pseudobarbus. At times that lay before the division process Gondwana, developed in the Cape region which partly endemic habitats for insects, arthropods, small dragonflies, flying insects, such as stoneflies and amphibians such as frogs ghost.

Typical Botany are sour grass plants such as cornices, Thurniaceae from the family of Süßgrasartigen and Dicranaceae from the family of mosses. Furthermore, the vegetation is dominated by mountain fynbos, silver tree plants, silver trees, Soapberry, Daisy Family, spindle tree plants and fields of sugar bushes. In addition, enter the mountains, rooibos, delphiniums, Rutaceae, and orchids in higher regions.