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Not 100% sure about Boston but a number of subtropical plants can grow in and around NYC that can't grow much farther north. For example American Holly, Crape Myrtle, Magnolia (virginiana), Dogwood. I've even seen some trunking palms along the beaches in New Jersey, though they might need some protection during cold snaps in the winter. Sure, you won't find lemon groves around here, but this is the northern end of the transition.
I think the term subtropical might be relative to location, when it comes to plants. None of those plants would be regarded as subtropical here. The term here would typically apply to frost tender plants, that could only handle light frosts -guava, passionfruit, bananas,tree ferns, mangroves, more tender palms etc. A large range of winter flowering plants, plus winter bee activity would also be signs of what I regard as subtropical.
I don't see a problem with the large geographical spread or diverse winters of the humid subtropical group. They all seem to share similar genetics (as wavehunter calls them), even if they manifest differently. I just think the term subtropical should relate more to vegetation similarities due to milder winters. I think it better describes a climate characteristic, rather than a climate group.
Is Miami south of the tropic of Cancer? If it is then it it 'tropical', to be tropical you literally have to reside between the tropic of Cancer and the tropic of Capricorn - hence 'tropical', it is generally considered that places in the 'tropics' do not have four seasons (spring, summer, autumn & winter) but 'wet' and 'dry' seasons.
Hmm...palm trees and other tropical plants dominate the shoreline, and the airport averages 76/60F in the coldest month. It sure looks tropical to me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CrueRulz
If I understand correctly, "subtropical" simply means the average temperature (day+night/2) in the coldest month is at or above freezing. Which means, places that can get HUGE snowstorms, like, say, Washington, DC, are "subtropical".
It's more of a combination of snowpack and frozen ground that makes the difference. A place that has a snowpack and frozen ground persistently in winter is continental, and a place that doesn't is subtropical (or some other mild-winter climate type such as Cfb). The -3C isotherm best fits the natural lines, though it's not a perfect fit.
As for the huge snowstorms, yes, some subtropical climates do get huge snowstorms. However, barring parts of Japan I know of no Cfa climates that get huge snowstorms on a regular basis. DC has had only a few 20+ inch snowstorms in 100 years of record-keeping, and even on the rare occasion they do occur they don't stick around. Almost without exception, the snow turns to mud within a few weeks even if it's the middle of January. That doesn't happen in a typical winter in a continental climate, much less an abnormally snowy and cold winter.
There are exceptions to this - the winter of 1780 in the Mid-Atlantic saw snow stick around through the whole winter, but that isn't remotely close to being average, which is the basis of climate classification. Quite sensibly so, since it would be irrational to take 1 winter's conditions over the other 250 winters when classifying the climate.
If we worked under that system, it would be fair of me to use January 2012's warmth as if it was normal and draw the subtropical line all the way up to Madison, Wisconsin (in Jan 2012 Madison did average a bit over -3C), and 2012 isn't even as extreme as 1780 was. If the continental zone extends to places where there's snow for a week in a record-cold winter, why not extend the subtropical zone up to where there can be thawing during record-warm winters? That would be around the Manitoba border. Since the vast majority of winters are snow-covered, it makes sense for those places to be continental, just as it makes sense for the the Mid-Atlantic to be subtropical (the vast majority of winters are bare).
This graphic was intended to demonstrate the difference between a joke of a winter and a real winter, but it just as aptly sums up the difference between continental and subtropical.
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Originally Posted by nei
I'm grew up in the Cfa zone, or at least near the very edge of it and my idea of subtropical was rather different. Temperate to me meant any mid-latitude climate with seasons, though not necessarily even.
Goes to show that most of these arguments are just semantics.
Exactly. The definition of temperate is one of the biggest semantic headaches.
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Originally Posted by Infamous92
Central Florida falls just short of being truly tropical, I don't know why it's seen as the archetype of Cfa, if anything it's just as much of an outlier as NYC/DC is.
That's what I say all the time. If you take the average of the 18C boundary and the -3C boundary, you come up with 7.5C for the coldest month, which almost exactly matches Jackson, Mississippi. Since it well meets the 22C summer criterion, Jackson is about as close as you can get to a subtropical archetype. It meets most of the subtropical stereotypes, which makes its position as the middle-of-the-road archetype of the Koeppen zone rather ironic.
Not 100% sure about Boston but a number of subtropical plants can grow in and around NYC that can't grow much farther north. For example American Holly, Crape Myrtle, Magnolia (virginiana), Dogwood. I've even seen some trunking palms along the beaches in New Jersey, though they might need some protection during cold snaps in the winter. Sure, you won't find lemon groves around here, but this is the northern end of the transition.
I didn't think about this in my previous reply, but aren't all (native) plant species that grow in NYC subtropical, if NYC is a subtropical climate?
Likewise NZ wouldn't have any subtropical species at all - under Koppen.
Well do you consider decidous trees as subtropical.
If they come from subtropical zones, then in theory yes.
The term subtropical gets used a lot in the world of plants but is seriously out of step with Koppen's perceived wisdom. According to his system, NYC should be a subtropical plant collector's paradise, while NZ can't boast a single subtropical species.
Well it seems koppen gets it wrong, many tree species that grow in and round NYC are also grown in Europe and places north of NYC in North America. I don't consider any plants grown naturally in NYC as subtropical not in the slightest. Yes people grow palms but during the winter it would need protection.
Also another thing in oceanic climates like were I live you can see small palms growing does that make London subtropical because it can grow subtropical/tropical plants? But those palms growing in oceanic climes and NYC are not naturally occuring andf is not part of the natural ecosystem.
Well it seems koppen gets it wrong, many tree species that grow in and round NYC are also grown in Europe and places north of NYC in North America. I don't consider any plants grown naturally in NYC as subtropical not in the slightest. Yes people grow palms but during the winter it would need protection.
Also another thing in oceanic climates like were I live you can see small palms growing does that make London subtropical because it can grow subtropical/tropical plants? But those palms growing in oceanic climes and NYC are not naturally occuring andf is not part of the natural ecosystem.
I don't have an objection to Koppen's grouping of humid subtropical. It's the name I don't get.
Trewartha's grouping (subtropical) and name, are a far better match for the vegetation. People who have no interest in plants, generally can still identify subtropical vegetation.
I was referring to native species, but to answer your question - if London could grow more than just a handful of palm species and with ease, then I would consider it subtropical. It would need to fit Trewartha's subtropical definition to do so anyway
I didn't think about this in my previous reply, but aren't all (native) plant species that grow in NYC subtropical, if NYC is a subtropical climate?
Likewise NZ wouldn't have any subtropical species at all - under Koppen.
I guess you mean't to say "shouldn't" instead of "aren't". Anyway, I'm not sure I know enough about NYC's native flora to answer your question. NYC's climate is different (warmer) now than it was hundreds of years ago. Human habitation changed both the climate and the environment. Settlers from Asian and Europe introduced new species to is hard to say what is native anymore.
You can't really go by the plants the way Joe90 describes it since most plants cross zone boundaries. There isn't one zone that exclusively has one set of plants and then right across the line the plants are a totally different set. Nature doesn't work like that. If you try to find a subtropical plant, i.e. a plant whose range corresponds neatly to the subtropical zone, it would be very difficult. It would likewise be difficult to find a "continental plant" or "oceanic plant". Plants and trees routinely cross climate zones of all shapes and sizes, and geography is just as important as climate when it comes to the native range. Just look at the difference between Britain's oceanic climate and New Zealand's oceanic climate.
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