STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 265 



THE MODIFYING EFFECTS 



THE GREAT DESERTS OF CALIFORNIA AND NEVADA HAVE UPON THE 

 TEMPERATURE OF THE INTERIOR VALLEYS OF THE STATE. 



The causes that produce the peculiar climatic conditions in the way of 

 temperature distribution in the great interior valleys of California, are well 

 and ably set forth in an article by the late lamented the Honorable B. B. 

 Redding, and is a portion of a very interesting paper published by the State 

 Agricultural Society in 1877, and is as follows: 



In addition to the effects due to latitude, to the Pacific Ocean and its 

 Japan Gulf Stream, the temperature of the State is materially modified by 

 the Colorado, Mohave, and Nevada Deserts, lying south and east of this 

 State. These great reservoirs daily absorbing and daily radiating heat on 

 the south and east, the Gulf Stream giving up its heat on the northwest, 

 together combine to send the isothermal lines nearly as far north as they 

 are in the western part of Europe. Redding, at the northern end of the 

 Sacramento Valley, latitude, 40° 35', longitude, 122° 22', elevation, 558 feet, 

 has a mean annual temperature of 64°, within 2' as warm as Charleston, 

 South Carolina, 8° further south; the latter city having a mean of 66.° Red 

 Bluff, latitude, 40° 10', longitude. 122° 15', elevation, 307 feet, has an annual 

 mean temperature of 66°, the same as Charleston. Chico, in latitude 39° 

 40', has a mean temperature of 62°, or but 4° less than Charleston. 



Coming south through the center of the Sacramento Valley from Red- 

 ding on the north, to Sumner on the extreme south, the mean annual tem- 

 perature of the various successive stations show the effect of the radiation 

 of heat in this valley, and the influence of the wind from the cool gulf 

 stream where it flows through the Golden Gate and up the Sacramento 

 River. 



The mean annual temperature for the places named will show it very 

 plainly: 



Redding has an annual mean temperature of 64° 1' 



Red Blurt has an annual mean temperature of 66° 2' 



Chico has an annual mean temperature of. 62° 5' 



Marysville has an annual mean temperature of 63° 6 



Sacramento has an annual mean temperature of 60° 5' 



Stockton has an annual mean temperature of . 62° 0' 



Modesto has an annual mean temperature of '. 63° 7' 



Merced has an annual mean temperature of 63° 2' 



Borden has an annual mean temperature of 66° 4' 



Tulare has an annual mean temperature of 64° 1' 



Delano has an annual mean temperature of 68° 6' 



Sumner has an annual mean temperature of 68° 3' 



It will be seen by the mean yearly average that Sacramento is the cool- 

 est place in the valley, the temperature increasing both north and south 

 from this point. The breeze from the ocean in the Summer follows up the 

 river and reaches Sacramento each day about 5 p. m., and thus reduces the 

 mean of its temperature. It may be from the same influence that its rain- 

 fall is increased above the next stations north and south. The reduction 

 of temperature at Sacramento by the air from the ocean passing through 

 the Golden Gate and up the Sacramento River was noted and commented 

 on by the Rev. J. H. C. Bonte, in his discourse on the northerly winds of 



