Land use: This area is about 70 percent woodland, 18 percent cropland, and 9 percent pastureland. About 3 percent is used for coal mining, urban development or other purposes. About 83 to 88 percent of the woodland is privately owned, 10 to 15 percent industry owned, and about 2 percent federally owned. Timber production is mostly in the southern half of the area. Poultry production is the major farm enterprise. Corn, cotton, and vegetables are the major cash crops. Controlling erosion on soils that are cropped is the primary concern of management. Pastures are grazed mainly by beef cattle and are important disposal areas for poultry wastes.
Elevation and topography: Elevation ranges from 100 to 400 m, but a few mountaintops are as high as 500 m. The area is deeply dissected and consists mainly of a series of rather narrow valleys, steep escarpments, and broad plateaus that are underlain by sandstone and shale. Valley floors are commonly about 100 m below adjacent plateau summits.
Climate: Average annual precipitation-1,300 to 1,400 mm. Precipitation is somewhat unevenly distributed. The maximum is in midwinter, decreasing gradually from spring to autumn and increasing slightly in midsummer. Average annual temperature-16 to 17 C. Average freeze-free period-Mainly 200 to 210 days but ranges to 240 days in some valleys.
Water: In most years, precipitation is adequate for crops and pastures. Droughts are short and infrequent. Streams, springs, and ponds provide water for livestock. Deep wells provide an adequate supply of water for most domestic and municipal uses. Most streams flow intermittently and are often dry in summer and in autumn except after rainstorms. A few large reservoirs are in the area.
Soils: The dominant soils are Udults and Ochrepts. They have an udic moisture regime, a thermic temperature regime, and mixed mineralogy. They are over sandstone and shale and are mostly moderately fine textured to fine textured. Moderately deep, nearly level to steep Hapludults (Hartsells, Linker, and Townley series) are on broad plateaus, ridgetops, mountaintops, or upper side slopes. Deep Hapludults (Enders series) and Fragiudults (Wynnville series) are on some of the more level upland sites. Shallow, gravelly and very gravelly, nearly level to steep Dystrochrepts (Hector and Montevallo series) are on narrow upper valley slopes and ridgetops. Areas of rock outcrop are common on these sites. Deep Hapludults (Albertville series) and Paleudults (Allen series) are on lower side slopes and terraces.
Potential natural vegetation: This area supports mixed oak-pine forest vegetation. Shortleaf pine, loblolly pine, sweetgum, yellow-poplar, red oaks, and white oaks are the major overstory species. Dogwood and redbud are major midstory species. Japanese honeysuckle, greenbrier, low panicums, bluestems, and native lespedezas are understory species.