Geography
Germany is a European country roughly the same size as the American state of Montana sharing a border with nine other nations; Denmark in the north, Poland and Czechoslovakia in the east, Austria and Switzerland in the south, France and Luxembourg in the south-west, and Belgium and the Netherlands in the north-west. It extends over 850 kilometres from its northern border with Denmark to the Alps in the south, and approximately 650 kilometres from the Belgian border in the west to the Polish frontier in the east. Most of Northern Germany is part of the Great European Plain that extends across Europe from the Pyrenees Mountains in France to the Ural Mountains in Russia. The terrain of this region is predominantly flat with hills rarely reaching 200 metres in height, and is crossed by northward-flowing rivers such as the Elbe, Ems, Weser and Oder. Close to the Dutch border and along the Frisian North Sea coast the land is marshy and wetlands predominate, while the Baltic coast of Schleswig-Holstein is marked by a number of small, deep fjords with steep banks. Central Germany is part of the Central European Uplands that extends from the Massive Central in France to Czechoslovakia and Poland. The German uplands include the Rheinish Uplands divided by the Rhine and Moselle river valleys, and a number of other upland regions including the Bergishes Land, the Eifel, the Erzgebirge, the Hunsruck, the Rhon, the Rothaargebirge, the Siegerland, the Sauerland, the Taunus Hills, the Teutoburger Wald, the Thuringer Wald, the Vogelsburg, the Westerwald, the Wiehengebirge and the Harz Mountains. The Central German Uplands are moderate in height and rarely exceed 1,100 metres, and the southernmost portions consist of the Bohemian and Bavarian Forests which form a natural boundary between Germany and Czechoslovakia. Between the Central German Uplands and the Alpine Forelands on the Austrian and Swiss borderlands is some of the most highly productive agricultural land in Germany. The plains of the Maine River and the 300 kilometre Upper Rhine River Valley are rich in loess and loam soils and are extensively cultivated, and are flanked by the Black Forest, the Frankewald, the Odenwald and Spessart Hills and the Swabian and Franconian Albs to the south. The Alpine foreland bordering Austria and Switzerland accounts for a good part of Southern Germany, extending 400 kilometres and bounded by the Alps and Lake Constance in the south and the Bavarian Forest to the east. The German Alps which are divided into the Algauer, Bavarian Alps and Salzburg Alps account for only a small section of the Alps and the country’s area but include the Zugspitze which is Germany’s highest peak. Although located at a latitude north of the United States-Canadian border, Germany's climate is moderate and without sustained periods of cold or heat. The north-western and coastal regions have a maritime climate with warm summers and mild cloudy winters. Farther inland the climate shows continental influences marked by hot summers and colder winters. The Alpine regions and to a lesser degree the Central German Uplands have mountain climates characterized by lower temperatures because of higher altitudes and higher rainfall. Like the rest of Western Europe Germany’s climate is strongly influenced by the Gulf Stream and westerly winds from the Icelandic low-pressure system and the Azores high-pressure system in the Atlantic Ocean, which furnish Western Europe with moderate temperatures and rain laden clouds. Less frequent continental weather systems originating to the east in Russia leads to markedly different weather conditions, with high-pressure air masses bringing cold weather. The average annual precipitation is between 600 millimetres and 800 millimetres per annum, and as high as 2,000 millimetres a year in the southern mountains. Germany’s average annual temperature is about 9° C with variations caused by elevation. In Winter the average temperature is 1.6°C in the north and -2°C or lower in the south and east. During the summer the north is cooler than the south with temperatures averaging between 16°C and 18°C, and 19.4°C or slightly higher in the south, although temperatures can greatly exceed 30 °C throughout the country during heat waves.