The Ladysmith 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 sunny
Mostly sunny; warmer
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
Chance of showers
Showers likely
67° on Nov. 15, 1999, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1956. Next is 65° in 2001.
Ladysmith’s center stands about 1,150 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,090 ft to 1,230 ft, a difference of 140 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Atlanta, about 1,690 ft, 14 miles west.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Mafic metavolcanic rocks (basalt, basaltic-andesite), from the Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion 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 53×. 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: Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion years old. About 14 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 7 mi of the line.
Metavolcanic. Age: Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Granite, tonalite, gneiss. Age: Paleoproterozoic, 1.8 to 1.9 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.
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 Ladysmith reaches the Gulf of America by way of the Flambeau, the Chippewa and the Mississippi: about 1,880 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Wissota and Holcombe Flowage.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Ladysmith; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Ladysmith has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 79° in July; winter nights fall to about 2° in January. About 34 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Ladysmith normally reaches 40° and falls to 25°. The record high is 64°, in 1990; the record low −1°, in 1996. The most rain on this date, 0.13 in, fell in 2000.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1956 at Big Falls Hydro, 9 miles northeast. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
