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Butte – A butte is a landform that looks like a tall, skinny hill with steep, almost vertical sides and a flat top. It's usually made of layers of rock, with the top layer being very hard and resistant to erosion (the slow wearing away of rock by wind, rain, and other natural forces). Over a long period of time, the softer rock around the butte gets worn down, but the tougher rock on top helps protect the rest of it, so it stays standing while the land around it disappears.
Buttes are often found in dry, desert regions where there’s not much vegetation to protect the land from erosion. You might see them standing alone out in the middle of flat ground, like a giant stone pedestal or tower. Because they’re usually taller than they are wide, buttes look different from mesas, which are wider and more spread out on top.
Buttes are eye-catching and often become landmarks because of their unusual shape and the way they rise up suddenly from the land around them.
See also: Mesa – a landform that’s kind of like a butte, but usually much wider and flatter across the top.
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