Climate
Average precipitation, limited by the rain shadow effects of the Cascade Range and the Ochoco Mountains, varies from 9 to 16 inches (230 to 410 mm) a year. In winter, much of the precipitation arrives as snow.
Weather data for the city of Mitchell, near the Painted Hills Unit, show that July and August are the warmest months, with an average high of 86 °F (30 °C) and an average low of 52 °F (11 °C). January is the coldest month, when highs average 42 °F (6 °C) and lows average 24 °F (−4 °C). The highest recorded temperature in Mitchell was 107 °F (42 °C) in 1972, and the lowest was −27 °F (−33 °C) in 1983. May is generally the wettest month, when precipitation averages 1.65 inches (42 mm).
| Climate data for Mitchell, Oregon | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Average high °F (°C) | 42 (6) |
47 (8) |
54 (12) |
60 (16) |
69 (21) |
77 (25) |
86 (30) |
86 (30) |
77 (25) |
65 (18) |
49 (9) |
42 (6) |
62.8 (17.1) |
| Average low °F (°C) | 24 (−4) |
27 (−3) |
31 (−1) |
34 (1) |
40 (4) |
47 (8) |
52 (11) |
52 (11) |
44 (7) |
36 (2) |
30 (−1) |
25 (−4) |
36.8 (2.7) |
| Precipitation inches (mm) | 0.87 (22.1) |
0.62 (15.7) |
1.00 (25.4) |
1.22 (31) |
1.65 (41.9) |
1.13 (28.7) |
0.61 (15.5) |
0.65 (16.5) |
0.67 (17) |
0.80 (20.3) |
1.12 (28.4) |
0.99 (25.1) |
11.33 (287.8) |
| Source: The Weather Channel | |||||||||||||
Read more about this topic: John Day Fossil Beds National Monument
Famous quotes containing the word climate:
“A tree is beautiful, but what’s more, it has a right to life; like water, the sun and the stars, it is essential. Life on earth is inconceivable without trees. Forests create climate, climate influences peoples’ character, and so on and so forth. There can be neither civilization nor happiness if forests crash down under the axe, if the climate is harsh and severe, if people are also harsh and severe.... What a terrible future!”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“The climate of Ohio is perfect, considered as the home of an ideal republican people. Climate has much to do with national character.... A climate which permits labor out-of-doors every month in the year and which requires industry to secure comfort—to provide food, shelter, clothing, fuel, etc.—is the very climate which secures the highest civilization.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“Nobody is so constituted as to be able to live everywhere and anywhere; and he who has great duties to perform, which lay claim to all his strength, has, in this respect, a very limited choice. The influence of climate upon the bodily functions ... extends so far, that a blunder in the choice of locality and climate is able not only to alienate a man from his actual duty, but also to withhold it from him altogether, so that he never even comes face to face with it.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)