Natural wonder North America
Gros Morne National Park
Gros Morne National Park is in Newfoundland, Canada. It has tall cliffs, deep lakes and very old rocks.
Gros Morne National Park, on Newfoundland's Great Northern Peninsula in Canada, shows how Earth's plates move. Its rocks include a slice of ancient sea floor and rock from Earth's mantle, and glaciers carved its cliff-walled freshwater fjords.
Gros Morne National Park (World Heritage 1987; 180,500 ha) holds textbook examples of plate tectonics: a complete ophiolite (a slice of Iapetus Ocean floor) thrust onto North America's ancient margin, exposed upper mantle, and landlocked freshwater fjords.
Photo: Aconcagua, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Discover Gros Morne
Gros Morne National Park is on the island of Newfoundland in Canada.
In this photo, bare branches stand in front of a blue lake and tall cliffs.
Gros Morne National Park lies on the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland, in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. UNESCO calls it some of the world's best examples of plate tectonics, and describes its landlocked freshwater fjords and glacier-scoured highlands.
This photo by Aconcagua, taken on 12 August 2005, shows Western Brook Pond: blue water beyond pale, bare branches and tall grass, a line of dark forest, and steep cliffs with a flat-topped mountain under white clouds.
UNESCO: on the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland and Labrador; 180,500 ha; inscribed 1987 under criteria vii and viii for textbook examples of earth-building forces and an outstanding demonstration of glaciation in an island setting. Parks Canada: the park protects parts of the Western Newfoundland Highlands and St. Lawrence Lowlands, with boreal forest, arctic-alpine barrens, wetlands, lakes, rivers and 170 km of coastline.
The photo (Aconcagua, GFDL / CC BY-SA 3.0, 12 August 2005, a Commons quality image) shows Western Brook Pond with weathered branches and grass in front, forest beyond and steep cliffs at the gorge.
- Area (UNESCO)
- 180,500 ha
- Coastline (Parks Canada)
- 170 km
- World Heritage Site
- since 1987
A slice of an ancient ocean
Very long ago, an ocean opened and closed here.
A piece of the old sea floor was pushed up onto the land.
Parks Canada explains that about 1,200 million years ago, two continents collided and made a huge mountain range. Later the land split apart, and by 570 million years ago a new ocean, the Iapetus Ocean, had opened.
About 500 million years ago that ocean began to close. By about 475 million years ago, a slice of its sea floor, called an ophiolite, was shoved up onto the edge of North America. Parks Canada says western Newfoundland is one of the few places on Earth where rock from the mantle can be studied directly.
Parks Canada: a Precambrian collision about 1,200 million years ago left the granites and gneisses of the Long Range; rifting filled fractures with diabase dykes (seen in the cliffs of Western Brook Pond) and by 570 Ma opened the Iapetus Ocean. Cambrian-Ordovician shelf sediments became quartzites, limestones and dolomites; slope landslides left limestone breccia.
The Iapetus began closing about 500 Ma; new oceanic crust (peridotite and dunite, gabbro, sheeted dykes, pillow basalt) formed an ophiolite, which around 475 Ma was thrust over the continental margin. Western Newfoundland is one of the few places where the Moho and upper mantle can be studied directly; the last two million years of glaciation shaped the scenery.
Fjords carved by ice
Glaciers once covered this land. They carved deep valleys with steep cliffs.
Now those valleys hold long lakes.
UNESCO says glaciers scoured the highlands and carved spectacular fjords, which are now landlocked and filled with fresh water. Parks Canada says repeated glaciations and changes in sea level over the last two million years shaped the scenery we see today.
The ice also uncovered the park's rocks, making its geology easy to see. UNESCO notes that erosion is still going on, shaping and exposing the rock layers.
UNESCO: spectacular landlocked, freshwater fjords and glacier-scoured headlands in an ocean setting; in glacier-scoured highlands and fjords, glaciation has made the geological features visible; erosion continues to shape and expose the sequences.
Parks Canada: since the Devonian the rocks have stayed relatively stable apart from erosion, uplift and slight faulting; the last two million years of repeated glaciation, deglaciation and sea-level change shaped the present scenery.
Caribou, arctic hares and ptarmigan
Caribou, black bears and arctic hares live in the park.
Whales and seals swim off its coast.
Parks Canada calls Gros Morne one of the best places in Canada to see caribou and ptarmigan. Both male and female woodland caribou grow antlers. Arctic hares here are the most southerly population of this tundra animal.
Moose were brought to Newfoundland over a century ago and grew so many that they kept forests from growing back; the park now keeps their numbers lower. Minke whales and harbor seals can be seen along the coast.
Parks Canada: woodland caribou (both sexes grow antlers; Gros Morne Mountain closes from May to the last Friday in June to protect newborn caribou and ptarmigan), the most southerly arctic hare population, black bears, boreal chickadees, rock and willow ptarmigan, minke whales and harbor seals.
Introduced moose peaked at 7,800 in 1995 and slowed forest regrowth; the park now manages them at a sustainable level and forests are recovering (UNESCO also notes the moose's impact).
Exploring safely
If you see a bear, stay calm and back away slowly.
Keep food packed away.
Black bears live throughout the park but are rarely seen. Parks Canada says that if you meet one, stay calm and do not run. Stop, back away slowly while facing the bear and talking softly, and take another route.
Keep campsites clean and store food in your vehicle when you are not eating. Some areas close for part of the year to protect wildlife, so check before you go.
Parks Canada black bear guidance: stay calm, do not run or play dead; stop, back away slowly facing the bear and speaking softly, and take an alternate route; keep campsites clean and store food in your vehicle.
Seasonal closures protect wildlife (Gros Morne Mountain from May to the last Friday in June for caribou calving and ptarmigan).
Amazing facts
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At Gros Morne you can see rock from deep inside the Earth.
Western Newfoundland is one of the few places on Earth where rock from the upper mantle can be studied directly.
Parks Canada: western Newfoundland is one of the few places where the Mohorovicic Discontinuity and the upper mantle can be studied directly.
-
Female caribou here grow antlers too!
Both male and female woodland caribou grow antlers.
Parks Canada: uniquely, both male and female caribou grow antlers; in winter they paw through half a meter of snow to reach lichens they can smell.
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Some of the park's rocks were once at the bottom of a tropical sea.
The park's limestones formed from the shells of snails, brachiopods and trilobites in warm, shallow tropical seas.
Parks Canada: carbonate banks of snail, brachiopod, trilobite and algal-mat remains in shallow tropical waters became the park's limestone and dolomite.
Words to know
- mantle
- the thick, hot layer of rock under Earth's crust
- ophiolite
- a slice of old ocean floor pushed up onto land
- fjord
- a long, deep valley carved by a glacier, with steep sides
- plate tectonics
- the slow movement of the giant pieces of Earth's outer shell
- caribou
- a kind of deer of the far north; both males and females have antlers
Discovery challenge
-
In which country is Gros Morne National Park?
Gros Morne is on the island of Newfoundland in which country?
In which country's province of Newfoundland and Labrador is Gros Morne?
- Canada
- Norway
- Chile
Show the answer
Canada
Canada.
Canada.
Canada (UNESCO).
-
What big idea about the Earth do Gros Morne's rocks show?
UNESCO says Gros Morne shows some of the world's best examples of which process?
For examples of which process was Gros Morne inscribed under criterion viii?
- Plate tectonics
- Coral reef growth
- Desert dunes
Show the answer
Plate tectonics
That Earth's plates move.
Plate tectonics.
Plate tectonics and continental drift (UNESCO).
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What was pushed up onto the land here long ago?
What slice of rock was shoved onto North America's edge about 475 million years ago?
What is the sequence of peridotite, gabbro, sheeted dykes and pillow basalt called?
- A piece of old sea floor
- A meteorite
- A volcano's ash cloud
Show the answer
A piece of old sea floor
A piece of old sea floor.
A slice of Iapetus Ocean floor, an ophiolite.
An ophiolite (Parks Canada).
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What carved the deep valleys with cliffs?
What carved the park's fjords?
Which process scoured the highlands and made the fjords now filled with fresh water?
- Glaciers
- Earthquakes
- People
Show the answer
Glaciers
Glaciers.
Glaciers.
Glaciation (UNESCO; Parks Canada).
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What should you do if you see a black bear?
Parks Canada says that if you meet a black bear you should do what?
What is Parks Canada's advice on meeting a black bear?
- Stay calm and back away slowly
- Run away fast
- Walk up to it
Show the answer
Stay calm and back away slowly
Stay calm and back away slowly.
Stay calm, don't run, back away slowly while facing it.
Stay calm, do not run or play dead, back away slowly facing the bear and take another route (Parks Canada).
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For parents & teachers
What children will learn
- Locate Gros Morne National Park in Newfoundland, Canada.
- Explain how an ocean can open and close as plates move.
- Describe how glaciers carve fjords.
- Explain what to do if you meet a black bear.
Recommended ages: 3 to 17 · About 15 minutes
Talk about it
- Why is it special to see rock from Earth's mantle at the surface?
- How could limestone made in a tropical sea end up in cold Newfoundland?
- Why might too many moose stop a forest from growing back?
Try at home or in class
- Stack colored layers of modeling clay to make 'sea floor', then push it over another stack to model how an ophiolite was thrust onto land.
- On a map of Canada, find Newfoundland and its Great Northern Peninsula.
Key vocabulary: mantle, ophiolite, fjord, plate tectonics, caribou
Where these facts come from
- Wikidata , Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)
- Gros Morne National Park (World Heritage List) , UNESCO World Heritage Centre
- Geology: Gros Morne National Park , Parks Canada
- Nature: Gros Morne National Park , Parks Canada
- Wildlife: Gros Morne National Park , Parks Canada
- File:Gros Morne NP westernbrookpond2.jpg , Wikimedia Commons
- UNESCO World Heritage List , UNESCO World Heritage Centre (Linked as a reference; site facts come from Wikidata)
- Wikimedia Commons , Wikimedia Foundation (Per file (public domain, CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA); see each media record)
Checked, not yet human-reviewed. Last updated November 1, 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.