All of the New England colonies had been covered by ice during the last Ice Age, which created poor, rocky soil. The final melt-back of the glaciers left some of the rocky areas peppered with large boulders.
Rivers are fairly short and their floodplains are narrow, unlike in other areas of America, and do not allow for the creation of huge agricultural plots along their banks.
The major resources available and used by the colonists were lumber and fish.
