The Montrose plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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72° on Nov. 13, 1973, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1895. Next is 72° in 1980.
Montrose’s center stands about 5,810 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 5,680 ft to 6,030 ft, a difference of 350 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Poverty Mesa, about 9,710 ft, 14 miles east.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Modern alluvium (unconsolidated), from the Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old.
The section below crosses 10 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 7×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sandstone, shale, conglomerate. Age: Early Cretaceous to Late Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Early Cretaceous to Late Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Sandstone, mudstone, claystone. Age: Late Jurassic, 145 to 164 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Gravel, unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene, less than 0.5 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 4 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Montrose reaches the Gulf of California by way of Cedar Creek, the Uncompahgre, the Gunnison and the Colorado: about 1,250 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Mead, Lake Powell, Lake Mohave and Lake Havasu.
Seldom reaches the sea. Dams and canals now take nearly all of the Colorado before its old delta in Mexico.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Montrose; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Montrose has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 90° in July; winter nights fall to about 18° in January. A normal year brings about 22 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 9 inches of water.
On November 14 Montrose normally reaches 53° and falls to 28°. The record high is 70°, in 1914; the record low −2°, in 1916. The most rain on this date, 0.66 in, fell in 2004.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1895 at Montrose No 2, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
