The Dixon 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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−19° on Nov. 12, 2000, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1979. Next is −10° in 1982.
Dixon’s center stands about 6,360 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 6,310 ft to 6,790 ft, a difference of 480 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Bakers Peak, about 9,380 ft, 9 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Alluvium and Colluvium (clay, silt, sand), from the Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old.
The section below crosses 10 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 9×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Claystone, shale, sandstone. Age: Eocene, 34 to 56 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Sandstone, shale. Age: Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Miocene, 5.3 to 23 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 66 to 100 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Paleocene, 56 to 66 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Clay, silt, sand. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 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. 4 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.
A raindrop that lands in Dixon reaches the Gulf of California by way of the Little Snake, the Yampa, the Green River and the Colorado: about 1,500 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Mead, Lake Powell, Lake Mohave and Lake Havasu.
Seldom reaches the sea. Dams and canals now take nearly all of the Colorado before its old delta in Mexico.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Dixon; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Dixon has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 87° in July; winter nights fall to about 7° in January. A normal year brings about 30 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 11 inches of water.
On November 14 Dixon normally reaches 45° and falls to 19°. The record high is 64°, in 2025; the record low −10°, in 1982. The most rain on this date, 0.17 in, fell in 1983.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1979 at Baggs, 6 miles west, 120 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
