Cimates In Brazil
Brazil’s climate varies considerably around the country because it spans such a wide area. While the North is mostly tropical due to the equator traversing the mouth of the Amazon, below the Tropic of Capricorn, the climate is much more temperate. In all, there are six climatic regions in Brazil, tropical, semiarid, equatorial, highland tropical, temperate, and subtropical.
Along the equators, temperatures are very high, with the average temperature about twenty-five degrees Celsius. However, the summer extreme is reached in the temperate zones where temperatures can reach about forty degrees Celsius. Near the equator there is very little variation in weather from season to season, only the occasional cooling and rain.
Brazil’s other extreme is the frosts in the south, in the Tropic of Capricorn, which occur during the winter, which usually stretches from June to August. Some years there are heavy snowfalls on the high plateaus and mountainous areas of some of the states. Most frequently, snow falls in the states of Santa Catarina, Parana, and Rio Grande do Sul. However, snow also occasionally falls in the states of Sao Paulo, Rio de Janiero, Espirito Santo, and Minas Gerais. Cities like Brasilia and Belo Horizonte are moderate because of their elevation of nearly one thousand meters, and temperatures usually fluctuate between fifteen and thirty degrees Celsius. Along the coast, cities such as Recife, Salvador, and Rio de Janeiro enjoy warm climates with average temperatures from twenty-three to twenty-seven degrees Celsius. They also enjoy constant trade winds. Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Porto Alegre, and Curitiba have subtropical climates that are similar to the South of the United State sand Europe, although temperatures can fall below freezing in the winter.
Levels of precipitation vary widely across Brazil. Most of the country has a fairly moderate rainfall that falls between one thousand and one and a half thousand mm a year. Most of that rain falls in the summer, which stretches from December to April, especially south of the Equator. The Amazon region, on the other hand, is notoriously humid, and has rainfall that is closer to two thousand mm each year, and sometimes reaches rainfall as high as three thousand mm in parts of the western Amazon, especially near Belem. Many don’t know that the Amazon rain forest, despite its high levels of rainfall, actually has a three to five month dry season each year, the timing of which varies depending on the location relative to the equator.
The semiarid Northeast region of Brazil starkly contrasts with the wet Amazon rain forest. This region has scarce rainfall and severe droughts that come in cycles averaging every seven years. This is the driest part of the country, as well as the hottest. Between May and November, temperatures of more than thirty-eight degrees Celsius have been recorded. The sertao is a region of semidesert vegetation that is used for low-density ranching and turns green when there is rain.
This wide range of weather conditions in Brazil allows an abundance of different plants and animals to flourish.