The Mount Tabor 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.
−5° on Nov. 16, 1933, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1916. Next is −4° in 1916.
Mount Tabor’s center stands about 710 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 650 ft to 2,780 ft, a difference of 2,130 ft: mountain country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Equinox Mountain, about 3,830 ft, 14 miles south-southwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Winooski Dolostone (dolostone, phyllite), from the Middle Cambrian, 497 to 521 million years old.
The section below crosses 14 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.
Phyllite, metasiltstone. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1.2 to 1.6 billion years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Carbonate, marble, sandstone. Age: Early Ordovician to Middle Ordovician, 459 to 487 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Phyllite, metasiltstone. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Quartzite. Age: Early Cambrian, 521 to 542 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Paragneiss. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1.2 to 1.4 billion 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. 8 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.
Mount Tabor straddles the St. Lawrence Divide. Rain on the southeast side runs to Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean; most of the rest goes to the St. Lawrence River.
From the center of town, a raindrop reaches the St. Lawrence River by way of Big Branch, Otter Creek and the Richelieu: about 240 river miles. The St. Lawrence carries it on to the Atlantic. One that lands on the southeast side reaches Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean by way of Mount Tabor Brook, Utley Brook, the West River and the Connecticut: about 200 river miles.
Lake on the way: Lake Champlain.
120 miles of the trip are on Otter Creek.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Mount Tabor; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Mount Tabor has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 80° in July; winter nights fall to about 8° in January. A normal year brings about 75 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 40 inches of water.
On November 14 Mount Tabor normally reaches 47° and falls to 26°. The record high is 69°, in 1989; the record low 1°, in 2019. The most rain on this date, 1.20 in, fell in 1937.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1916 at Rutland, 19 miles north. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.