Kashmir Weather and Climate

The terrain of Kashmir is highly diversified. Kashmir has beautiful valleys and flowerlands, and almost all of the state is surrounded by mountainous areas. Kashmir is situated on a subtropical latitude, but because of the differences in altitude it doesn’t really have a subtropical climate. The state also has natural variation on a micro-level. This means that the terrain of Kashmir has a lot of different ecosystems on a very small scale. On the Koppen Classification Scheme Kashmir gets an overall Dfb climate. Dfb stands for a humid continental climate with cold and moist winters and short summers.       

Because of the many mountains in Kashmir the precipitation varies from place to place. The direction of the wind affects where the rain shadow will be and where the relief rain will fall. Most of the precipitation falls in Kashmir Valley. The mountains in Kashmir also protect the state from extreme weather. While the state Jammu that lies directly south of Kashmir needs to cope with -40°C during mid-winter, Kashmir’s lowest temperature is about 2°C. This helps the population a lot. Their biggest economy is agriculture and with temperatures being around the same all year long, it’s pretty easy to grow crops.

Kashmir has 6 seasons. Halfway through January the Very cold season (Shíshúr) starts, coming to an end mid March. That's when the Spring season (Sónth) starts, ending on the half of May. Next is the Hot season (grìshûm), ending halfway through July. After that the Rainy season (Vahràth) comes in, followed up by the Autumn season (harúd) starts in mid. September. The last season, the Cold season, (Vandû) starts around 15 November, and ends in January again.