Madoi County
| Madoi County རྨ་སྟོད་རྫོང 玛多县 | |
|---|---|
| County | |
  Madoi County Location in Qinghai | |
| Coordinates: 34°42′N 98°13′E / 34.700°N 98.217°ECoordinates: 34°42′N 98°13′E / 34.700°N 98.217°E | |
| Country | People's Republic of China |
| Province | Qinghai |
| Autonomous prefecture | Golog |
| Time zone | China Standard (UTC+8) |
| Madoi County | |||||||
| Chinese name | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 玛多县 | ||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 瑪多縣 | ||||||
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| Tibetan name | |||||||
| Tibetan | རྨ་སྟོད་རྫོང | ||||||
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Madoi County (Tibetan: རྨ་སྟོད་རྫོང ; Chinese: 玛多县; also Matö County or Maduo County) is a county of Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, in southeast-central Qinghai province. Its area is about 25,000 km2 (9,700 sq mi), and with an average elevation of 4,300 m (14,000 ft) it is the highest Chinese county by average elevation. In Madoi County is the upper stream of the Yellow River which flows to Ngoring and Gyaring lake.
Geography
With an elevation of around 4,300 m (14,000 ft), Madoi County has an alpine climate (Köppen EH), with long, bitterly cold and very dry winters, and brief, rainy, cool summers. Average low temperatures are below freezing from early September to mid June; however, due to the wide diurnal temperature variation, average highs are only below freezing from early November thru mid March. Despite frequent rain during summer, when a majority of days sees rain, no month has less than 50% of possible sunshine; with monthly percent possible sunshine ranging from 53% in June to 79% in November, the county seat receives 2,838 hours of bright sunshine annually. The monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from −16.8 °C (1.8 °F) in January to 7.5 °C (45.5 °F) in July, while the annual mean is −3.84 °C (25.1 °F), making the county seat one of the coldest locales nationwide in terms of annual mean temperature. Nearly three-fourths of the annual precipitation of 322 mm (12.7 in) is delivered from June to September.
| Climate data for Madoi County (1971−2000) | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Average high °C (°F) | −8 (18) |
−5.1 (22.8) |
−0.5 (31.1) |
4.4 (39.9) |
8.4 (47.1) |
11.3 (52.3) |
13.5 (56.3) |
13.6 (56.5) |
9.7 (49.5) |
3.8 (38.8) |
−2.8 (27) |
−6.7 (19.9) |
3.5 (38.2) |
| Average low °C (°F) | −24.1 (−11.4) |
−20.5 (−4.9) |
−14.6 (5.7) |
−9 (16) |
−3.8 (25.2) |
0.1 (32.2) |
2.4 (36.3) |
1.8 (35.2) |
−1.4 (29.5) |
−7.5 (18.5) |
−17.3 (0.9) |
−22.8 (−9) |
−9.7 (14.5) |
| Average precipitation mm (inches) | 3.6 (0.142) |
4.8 (0.189) |
8.7 (0.343) |
11.0 (0.433) |
31.2 (1.228) |
59.2 (2.331) |
72.7 (2.862) |
59.6 (2.346) |
46.8 (1.843) |
18.6 (0.732) |
2.9 (0.114) |
2.5 (0.098) |
321.6 (12.661) |
| Average precipitation days (≥ 0.1 mm) | 6.7 | 8.2 | 9.8 | 10.3 | 15.5 | 17.6 | 18.5 | 14.8 | 14.9 | 11.0 | 4.6 | 4.3 | 136.2 |
| Average relative humidity (%) | 57 | 55 | 52 | 50 | 57 | 64 | 68 | 65 | 65 | 61 | 56 | 55 | 58.8 |
| Mean monthly sunshine hours | 226.2 | 209.6 | 240.6 | 257.1 | 256.3 | 228.6 | 236.8 | 244.0 | 217.1 | 241.2 | 244.6 | 236.2 | 2,838.3 |
| Percent possible sunshine | 73 | 68 | 65 | 66 | 60 | 53 | 54 | 59 | 59 | 69 | 79 | 78 | 64 |
| Source: China Meteorological Administration | |||||||||||||
Administrative Divisions
Madoi is divided into two towns and two townships:
- Huashixia Town (花石峡镇)
- Mazhali Town (玛查理镇)
- Heihe Township (黑河乡)
- Zhalinghu Township (扎陵湖乡)