World Climate Regions

The world climate regions are divided into four groups:

1)Tropical climates:
-The tropical rain forest is hot and wet throughout the year. The warm, humid air creates a lot of moisture producing rain almost daily. It has a lot of vegetation that grows thickly in layers. It also has abundant wildlife. Tropical rain forests are found in the Amazon, other parts of South America, the Caribbean, Asia and Africa.


-The tropical savanna has dry winters and wet summers. There are fewer trees in the savanna than in the rain forest. Tropical savannas are found in Africa, Central and South America, Asia and Australia.



2)Mid-Latitude climates:
-The marine west coast has cool summers and damp winters due to the ocean winds. Since it rains a lot you can see the growth of both coniferous and deciduous trees. These mid-latitude climates are found in southern California, Europe, Parts of South America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand.


-Lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea have mild, rainy winters and hot, sunny summers. The natural vegetation includes chaparral. Any coastal mid-latitude area with these characteristics are classified as Mediterranean. Southern California, parts of southern Australia, southern Europe and parts of northern Africa are Mediterranean.



- The humid sub-tropical climates bring short, mild winters. It rains almost all year and is humid. For vegetation it has forests of evergreen and deciduous trees and prairies. The southern United States and southern parts of south America and Asia have humid sub- tropical climates.




-Southern Canada, western Russia and northeastern China are humid continental climate regions. Landforms are what influence the most in these regions. They don't experience ocean winds because of their northerly continental locations. The farther north you go the longer and more severe are the winters and the shorter and cooler are the summers. The evergreens outnumber the deciduous trees in the northern-most areas of the region.



3) Dry climates:
-Dry areas with spare plant life are called deserts. Yearly rainfall in deserts seldom exceeds 10 inches (about 25 cm), and temperatures vary widely from the heat of day to the cool of night and from season to season. Desert climates occur in just under one third of the earth's total land area. The natural vegetation of deserts consists of scatterd scrubs an cactus. The Sahara alone extends over almost the entire northern part of the African Continent.

-Often bordering deserts are dry, largly treeless grasslands called, steppes. Yearly rainfall in steppes area average from 10 to 20 inches (25 to 51 cm). The world's largest steppe stretches across eastern Europe and western and central Asia. Steppes are also found in North America, South America, Africa and Australia.

4) High Latitude climates:
-Just south of the Arctic Circle lie the subarctic climate regions. Winters here are bitterly cold and summers are short and cool. Subarctic regions have the world's widest temperature ranges, varying from winter to summer bye as much as 120F (49C). In parts of subarctic, only a thin layer of surface soil thaws each summer. Brief summer growing seasons may support needled evergreens.

-Closer to the polar regions, tundra climate regions are very cold. Here the winters darkness and bitter cold las for half the year, and the sun's indirect rays bring constant summer light but little heat. In tundra regions the layer of thawed soil is even thiner than in the subarctic. Since trees can't establish roots on these frigid plains, tundra vegetation is limited to low bushes, very short grass, mosses and lichens.


-Snow and ice, often more than 2 miles (3km) thick, constantly cover the surfaces of ice cap regions. Lichens are the only form of vegetation that can surface in these areas, where monthly temperature average below freezing. Earth's largest polar ice cap covers almost all of Antarctica. Greenland's interior also has an ice cap climate.



-Elevation can determine a climate region, regardless of the latitude. Highlands, such as high mountain areas, even along the Equator, share some of the same characteristics of high latitude climates because of the thinning of the atmosphere at high altitudes. The higher the elevation, the cooler the temperatures. The natural vegetation of highlands climates also varies with elevation.