CLIMATE OF MICHIGAN. 9 



.-south. The true import of the facts expressed by this line will be better 

 appreciated when we consider that the minimum of 24 degrees, which 

 includes the central portions of the State of Michigan, as far north as 45 

 degrees, expresses also the minimum at St, Louis, Missouri, in latitude a 

 little north of 38 degrees. 



These minima may, very probably, become subject to more or less varia- 

 tion, consequent upon the extensive removal of timber, in the clearing and 

 improvement of farm lands throughout the interior of the State, affording 

 freer scope to the winds from such direction, accompanied by greater and 

 more sudden variations of temperature, with results similar to that of the 

 winter of 1874-5, when the minimum, even in the fruit belt (as the region 

 along the easterly shore of Lake Michigan is more commonly called), was 

 two degrees lower than had previously occurred during the occupancy of the 

 country. This seems to have resulted from the unusual circumstance that 

 the paroxysm of cold occurred during the night, following the prevalence of 

 a wind from the northeast, precluding all benefit from the ameliorating influ- 

 ence of the open waters of lake Michigan lying at the west. The result of 

 this unusual depression of temperature seems to have been a very consider- 

 able amount of injury to the peach trees in the peach-growing regions, with 

 a nearly total loss of the crop of fruit, except in specially favorable loca- 

 tions, in which partial crops, and in very rare cases even full crops seem to 

 have escaped. It would seem to be a fact strongly indicative of the great 

 potency, as well as the extent of this great lake influence, that one at least 

 of these frost-proof orchards of the peach was located in the immediate 

 vicinity of Grand Traverse Bay, within a little over twenty degrees of the 

 arctic circle. With the exception of peaches, very little injury seems to 

 have occurred in the fruit belt ; although, away from the vicinity of the 

 lakes, the loss of the crop of fruit of all kinds was very general. 



That the result of this lake influence is more favorable upon the eastern 

 shore of Lake Michigan than upon the western, must be attributed to the 

 fact that the prevailing winds which bring frost or severe cold are westerly, 

 reaching the easterly or Michigan shore only after having traversed nearly or 

 quite one hundred miles of very deep, open water, to which, during the warm 

 season, they will have surrendered a very considerable increment of heat, 

 to be retained until it shall be wrestled for and re-absorbed by the colder 

 gales of late autumn and winter, thus quenching their excess of cold by the 

 transfer to them of a portion of the surplus heat of the warm season. 



The western shore of Lake Huron has, up to the present time, been mainly 

 given up to other pursuits than agriculture, hence little is practically known 

 of its horticultural capacities. If, however, aside from the character of its 

 soils, it shall be found less desirable for such purposes than the region along 

 the western shore of the State, the chief cause of such difference will doubt- 

 less be found in the preponderance of westerly and northwesterly winds, 

 which yield up much of the warmth absorbed in traversing Lakes Michigan or 

 Superior, while sweeping over the ample breadth of the peninsula, before 

 reaching the regions in question. 



The obvious and well-known results of these transfers of warmth are a 

 comparatively slow increase of temperature "with the opening of spring, 

 retarding growth and blooming till danger from spring frosts is mainly past, 

 and alse delaying the occurrence of frost in autumn, adding, at the end of 

 the growing and ripening season, more than sufficient time to compensate for 



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