270 GANNETT 



obvious reasons they seldom or never occur with a land 

 breeze. 



The coast of Bering Sea has a climate widely different 

 from that of the Pacific coast. The mean annual temper- 

 ature is much lower, even after due allowance for the dif- 

 ference in latitude. At St. Michael it is 26, and at Port 

 Clarence, in Bering Strait, it is 20. The range of tem- 

 perature is much greater. The mean temperature of the 

 coldest month at St. Michael is 2, of the warmest month 

 54, showing a range of 56. Similarly, at Port Clarence 

 the coldest month is 11, the warmest 50, a range of 

 61. The highest temperature on record at St. Michael 

 is 75, the lowest 55, a range of 130. The contrast 

 with the Pacific coast is still greater in the matter of rain- 

 fall, which at St. Michael is very light, amounting to only 

 14 inches annually. Moreover, rain falls in the warm 

 rather than in the cold season. 



The temperature of this coast is not much modified by 

 the sea. Bering Sea is practically a closed sea, the Aleu- 

 tian Islands forming a partial barrier against the warmer 

 waters of the Pacific; consequently its waters retain, to a 

 large extent at least, the temperature incident to the lati- 

 tude. Its mean annual temperature is little affected by 

 outside influences, and the greater part of it is frozen for 

 half the year. The extremes of temperature, however, are 

 reduced by the slow absorption and radiation of heat, just 

 as with the Pacific. As this region is north of the terri- 

 tory of the prevailing westerlies, the winds have no prev- 

 alent direction, but blow whithersoever they list. For 

 the same reason the rainfall is light. Though the air over 

 the sea is saturated with moisture, little of it drifts over 

 the land to supply rain. 



If there is a region more infested with fogs than the 

 Pacific coast of Alaska it is Bering Sea. Here fog is the 

 normal condition, and clear, bright weather the rare ex- 



