Almost all of Nevada lies within the Great Basin, which is part of the larger physiographic division known as the Basin and Range province. The Great Basin is located between the Sierra Nevada of California and the Wasatch Range of Utah. Actually, it is not a single basin, but rather a vast realm without drainage to the sea in which there are hundreds of north-south oriented valleys separated by mountain ranges.

A small part of Nevada lies within another physiographic region, the Sierra-Cascade province. Here a section of the Sierra Nevada extends across the state’s western edge. The mountain slopes reach down from Lake Tahoe toward Reno and Carson City. Mount Rose, located in a spur of the Sierra known as the Carson Range, rises to 10,778 ft.

Southern Nevada contains part of the Mojave Desert, another section of the Basin and Range. Although the appearance of the land is similar to that of most of the rest of the state, this region, bordering the Colorado River, is lower than the surrounding area. Nevada’s lowest elevation, 479 ft, is found where the Colorado River leaves the state.

In the northeast, Nevada shares two sections of the Columbia Plateau with Oregon and Idaho. These sections, the Owyhee Uplift section and the Snake River Plain, contain a number of rivers that drain north and belong to the Columbia River watershed.

The mountain ranges of Nevada are long rugged ridges. There are about 100 such ranges, most of them from 50 to 75 mi long and from 6 to 15 mi wide. They rise 3,000 to 5,000 ft above the surrounding basin surface and reach elevations of 13,000 ft above sea level.

Some of these ranges were created when huge sections of the earth’s crust were thrown up on their edges above the surrounding land. These are called fault-block ranges. In western Nevada, particularly, the fault scarps, or zones along the faces of the mountains where uplift took place, are clearly visible. In other parts of the state, clear evidence of mountain-building processes has been obscured by erosion. Small earthquakes are common in western Nevada, indicating that the mountains are still being uplifted gradually. The earth’s crust below the Great Basin is believed to be thinner than at any other place in North America. At the eastern base of the Sierra Nevada there have been eruptions of volcanic rock, and hot springs occur at the bases of many other Nevada mountain ranges. Mineral deposits, including gold and silver, are widespread in Nevada’s mountains. The larger and higher ranges are the Shoshone Mountains, Toiyabe Range, Toquema Range, Monitor Range, Ruby Mountains, Quinn Canyon Mountains, Shell Creek Range, Snake Range, and the Spring Mountains. Near the Nevada-California boundary in the White Mountains is the state’s highest summit, Boundary Peak, at 13,140 ft. Wheeler Peak 13,063 ft is at the eastern edge of Nevada.

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