The Shelley 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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−15° on Nov. 16, 1955, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1948. Next is −14° in 2014.
Shelley’s center stands about 4,630 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,580 ft to 4,660 ft, a difference of 80 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Birch Creek Mountain, about 7,470 ft, 14 miles east-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Alluvial deposits (gravel, sand, silt), from the Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old.
The section below crosses 8 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 9×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Gravel, sand, silt. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Basalt. Age: Pleistocene to Quaternary, less than 15,000 years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Rhyolite. Age: Late Miocene to Late Pliocene, 3 to 6.6 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Basalt. Age: Late Pliocene to Pleistocene, less than 3 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Age: Carboniferous to Permian, 252 to 324 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Sand. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 2 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 Shelley reaches the Pacific Ocean by way of the Snake and the Columbia: about 1,100 river miles.
Lakes on the way: American Falls Reservoir, Lake Umatilla, Brownlee Reservoir and Cove Arm Lake.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Shelley; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Shelley has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 87° in July; winter nights fall to about 12° in January. About 10 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Shelley normally reaches 44° and falls to 22°. The record high is 65°, in 1953; the record low −8°, in 1978. The most rain on this date, 0.90 in, fell in 1971.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1948 at Idaho Falls Faa Airport, 10 miles north-northeast, 100 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
