Canadian Agriculture. 
241 
phere .... As a rul(j the rains are chiefly in the months of May and June, 
the time they are most wanted for vegetation, while the fall months are gene- 
rally dry, so that rarely any difficulty is experienced in harvesting the crojis. 
The months of September, October, and November are looked upon as the 
finest season of the year, being remarkable for fine cool dry weather, unknown, 
I believe, in any other country." 
A description of the climate of the Canadian North- West can 
hardly be deemed satisfactory unless it includes an examination 
of the more general physiographical phenomena which combine 
to render that climate what it is, and I therefore propose to 
make a brief reference to the phenomena in question. The 
general rule that the temperature increases as the equator is 
approached, or as the poles are receded from, is liable to many 
local variations, determined chiefly by the relative disposition of 
land and sea. If places which have the same average annual 
temperature are joined together on the map, the line so drawn is 
called an isothermal line, and sometimes the isothermals are 
fairly parallel with the equator. But there are many exceptions, 
and a notable one occurs in the case of the Canadian North- 
West, where, between the meridians of 100^ and 120°, the 
isothermals rise very considerably to the north, the physical 
significance of which is that the North-West enjoys a much 
higher average temperature than many other parts of the globe in 
the same latitude. 
" The line of equal mean temperature, especially for the season of vegeta- 
tion, between March and October, instead of following lines of latitude, bends 
from the Mississiijpi valley far to the north, carrying the zone of wheat from 
Minnesota away to the GOth parallel in the valley of the Peace Elver, repro- 
ducing the summer heats of New Jersey and Southern Pennsylvania in Minne- 
sota and Dakota, and those of Northern Pennsylvania and Ohio in the valley of 
the Saskatchewan. Within the isothermal lines that inclose the zone west and 
northwest of Minnesota, which is being or is soon to be opened to cultivation, 
lies a vast area of fertile lands from which might easily be cut out a dozen 
new States of the size of New York." * 
At Fort Vermilion, 58° 24' N. and 116° 30' W., Professor 
Macoun found barley cut on August 6th, 1875, and wheat almost 
ripe, and this, be it observed, in a latitude coincident with that of 
the extreme north of Scotland. In Blodgett's ' American Climat- 
ology ' it is stated that the buffalo winters on the upper Athabasca 
at least as safely as in the latitude of St. Paul, Minnesota, and the 
spring opens at nearly the same time along the immense series 
of plains extending northward from the city of St. Paul to the 
Mackenzie River. Again, meteorological observations show 
that Winnipeg and Fort McLeod, 600 miles apart, but in the 
same latitude, have about the same temperature, while Fort 
* J. W. Taylor, United States Consul at Winnipeg. Quoted in Macoun's 
'Manitoba and the Great North-West,' p. 162. 
VOL. XXI. — S. S. K 
