The term tundra, a Russian word meaning Arctic hill, is used to describe a treeless region with frozen subsoil. Tundra climate type generally refers to the climate characteristics of cold zones north of the tree line in Eurasia, North America, and on the Arctic islands.
Many distinctions can be made between the tundra climates of high arctic, low arctic, and alpine zones (Fig. 1), but in general, all these zones have short growing seasons, extremely low temperatures and strong winds, and variable sunlight periods. The summers are very short, cold, and humid with foggy conditions. The summer temperature rarely exceeds 8–9°C, in the polar regions 2–3°C. Winter temperatures normally do not fall below −30° or −40°C and the strong winds (65 km/24-hr period) of arctic tundra have tremendous impact on the temperature patterns. Solar radiation receipts in winter are much lower in Arctic than in Alpine tundra. Although the Arctic tundra appears wetter, the amount of precipitation received is...
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References
Tieszen, L. L., 1978. Introduction and overview of the Barrow ecological system, in Vegetation and Production Ecology of an Alaskan Arctic Tundra. New York: Springer-Verlag, pp. 3–18.
Vankat, J. L., 1979. The Natural Vegetation of North America. New York: Wiley.
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© 1987 Van Nostrand Reinhold
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Lulla, K. (1987). Tundra climate . In: Climatology. Encyclopedia of Earth Science. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-30749-4_185
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-30749-4_185
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
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