Sketch of the Climate of China.

Abstract

China is a vast country with various topographical pecularities. As regard the climate of China however the great stretch in latitude and diversity in topo-graphy make no significant differences. The general character of the climate is, in the first place, determined by the prevalence of the monsoons. In winter cold air flows out all over the Far East from the grand anticyclonic area over south-eastern Siberia with its centre near Lake Baikal. This monsoon current bifurcates into two branches, one of them flowing around the Aleutian low in a cyclonic sense, and the other into the equatorial low area to the south of the China sea in an anticyclonic sense. Thus the winter monsoon comes from the northwest in north China and from the northeast in south China. In the cold season the monsoon blows very strongly and continues for many days together.Winter is very cold and dry in north China. The mean January temperature is -4.5°C. at Peking and -7.3°C. at Tayuan. The total fall of precipitation in January is 2.5mm at Peking and 2.1mm at Tayuan.In Summer the air flows into the Mongolian area of low pressure from the neighbouring seas and oceans. This monsoon blows from south to east in north China and southwesterly in south China. The summer monsoon is weak and intermittent. The isotherms run almost parallel to the coast line, the temperature becoming higher as we go to the interior. Thus the July temperature is 26.4°at Peking, 27.2° at Shanghai, 28.1° at Foochow and 27.9° at Hongkong. We have 30.8°C. at Hangchow, 29.9° at Kiukiang and 28.5°C. at Hankow. The rain falls copiously, the total fall in July being 200mm at Peking, 129mm at Shanghai, 180mm at Hankow, 202mm at Chengtu, and 333mm at Hongkong.The most noteworthy phenomena in the climatology of north China is dust storm in early spring and that in central China the Mai-yu or the plum-rain in early summer.China proper may be divided into four climatic regions, namely, north, central, south, and interior China climatic divisions. To these we may add the Outer Mongolia and Tibet as the remaining climatic regions.