Clouds and Climate of Las Vegas

In my previous post I learned that there isn't much of a water cycle here in Las Vegas, but what I have learned now is that there are still various types of clouds seen in the sky.

Clouds over New York New York

The picture above shows Cirrostratus clouds in the middle as well as what looks like Cirrocumulus clouds on the left of the image.

Beautiful clouds behind a resort.

In the photo above, there are some beautiful Cumulus clouds near the bottom of the picture and some Cirrocumulus clouds up top.

Various clouds over the strip.

In this last image, there are Stratocumulus clouds just above the Spring Mountains and above that there is a lenticular cloud.

Although there seems to be a lot of cloud coverage in Vegas, the climate has a midlatitude dessert type. The graph below compares the average precipitation to the average temperature over the span of a year. In a midlatitude dessert region, the dominant high pressure and lack of moisture combine to make the production of clouds.  The days and nights that the skies in Vegas are cloudless result in the large daily temperature ranges. Since Vegas lies in a midlatitude dessert, it experiences larger annual temperatures than the tropical desserts even though the midlatitude and tropical desserts are controlled by the same factors.

Climograph for Las Vegas, NV

Since Las Vegas is in a midlatitude dessert region, it makes sense that so much cloud coverage occurs here as seen in the above images. Overall, with the type of climate Vegas has and also all the various cloud types seen, it makes sense that there can be clouds without too much precipitation. This is something that I never knew and am glad to know now, since Vegas is one of my family's favorite vacation spots to visit.


Sources- http://favim.com/image/101932/
http://www.lvrealty.net/las-vegas/high-rise/sky-las-vegas
http://vinnyohare.com/pictures-from-las-vegas/
http://www4.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/ritter/geog101/textbook/climate_systems/midlatitude_desert.html