The Rocky Mound 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.
Mostly cloudy
Showers likely; cooler
Chance of showers; warmer
Sunny
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
Mostly sunny
5.62 inches of rain fell in two days, the most for this week of the year since records began in 1905. The next wettest, 4.65 inches, fell in 1971.
Rocky Mound’s center stands about 440 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 320 ft to 450 ft, a difference of 130 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Stivers Hill, about 650 ft, 14 miles west-southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Reklaw Formation (sandstone), from the Eocene, 34 to 56 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 64×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Mudstone. Age: Late Paleocene to Early Eocene, 48 to 59 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Siltstone, sandstone. Age: Middle Eocene, 38 to 48 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Eocene, 34 to 56 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Eocene, 34 to 56 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.
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 Rocky Mound reaches the Gulf of America by way of Monticello Reservoir, Big Cypress Creek, Big Cypress Bayou, Twelvemile Bayou, Cross Bayou, the Red River, the Atchafalaya and the Lower Atchafalaya: about 530 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Clear Lake, Lake O' the Pines and Monticello Reservoir.
260 miles of the trip are on the Red River.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Rocky Mound; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Rocky Mound has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 94° in August; winter nights fall to about 32° in January. About 49 inches of rain fall in a normal year, with about 2 inches of snow.
On November 14 Rocky Mound normally reaches 66° and falls to 41°. The record high is 88°, in 2005; the record low 17°, in 1940. The most rain on this date, 2.12 in, fell in 1958.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1905 at Mount Pleasant, 10 miles north. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
