The Dakota 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. 14, 1999, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1954. Next is 71° in 2001.
Dakota’s center stands about 850 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 830 ft to 950 ft, a difference of 120 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Morris, about 1,180 ft, 9 miles northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Cambrian, undivided (sandstone), from the Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 44×. 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. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 24 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 Dakota reaches Lake Michigan by way of Lunch Creek, the White River and the Fox River: about 130 river miles. From there it moves on through the Great Lakes, over Niagara Falls and down the St. Lawrence to the Atlantic.
Lakes on the way: Lake Winnebago 6124 and Lake Butte des Morts.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Dakota; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Dakota has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 82° in July; winter nights fall to about 8° in January. A normal year brings about 42 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 36 inches of water.
On November 14 Dakota normally reaches 45° and falls to 27°. The record high is 72°, in 1999; the record low 3°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.53 in, fell in 1956.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1954 at Montello Wwtp, 17 miles south. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
