The Tumalo 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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−8° on Nov. 16, 2014, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1991. Next is 11° in 2018.
Tumalo’s center stands about 3,210 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 3,150 ft to 3,500 ft, a difference of 350 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Bearwallow Butte, about 6,460 ft, 12 miles west-southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Lacustrine and fluvial sedimentary rocks (clay, silt, sand), from the Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old.
The section below crosses 7 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 6×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Basalt, basaltic-andesite. Age: Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 8 mi of the line.
Rhyolite, andesite. Age: Pliocene to Pleistocene, less than 5.3 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Basalt. Age: Miocene to Pliocene, 2.6 to 23 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Basaltic-andesite, basalt. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Basaltic-andesite, basalt. Age: Early Pliocene to Pleistocene, 1.2 to 3.9 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Basaltic-andesite, basalt, andesite. Age: Miocene, 5.3 to 23 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. 1 smaller unit 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 Tumalo reaches the Pacific Ocean by way of the Deschutes and the Columbia: about 360 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lake Billy Chinook.
200 miles of the trip are on the Columbia.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Tumalo; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Tumalo has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 82° in July; winter nights fall to about 23° in December. A normal year brings about 11 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 9 inches of water.
On November 14 Tumalo normally reaches 49° and falls to 28°. The record high is 72°, in 1999; the record low 13°, in 1993. The most rain on this date, 0.85 in, fell in 2014.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1991 at Bend 7 NE, 6 miles east-southeast, 150 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
