As the physical features of mountains are irregular, with broken jagged contours, there can be wide variations in temperature over short distances. The temperature at a location is dependent on the season, orientation and bearing with respect to the Sun, and the mass of the mountain. As the Sun is the major contributor to the temperature, it is often directly proportional to the received radiation from the Sun with faces receiving more sunlight having a higher heat buildup. In narrow valleys between steep mountain faces, the weather conditions may differ significantly on both the margins. The mountains act as heat islands and heavier mountains absorb and retain more heat than the surroundings, and therefore influences the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature from the winter minimum to the summer maximum. However, soil temperatures mostly remain the same on both the sides of a mountain at altitudes higher than .
As the physical features of mountains are irregular with broken jagged contours there can be wide variations in temperature over short distances The temperature at a location is dependent on the season orientation and bearing with respect to the Sun and the mass of the mountain As the Sun is the major contributor to the temperature it is often directly proportional to the received radiation from the Sun with faces receiving more sunlight having a higher heat buildup In narrow valleys between steep mountain faces the weather conditions may differ significantly on both the margins The mountains act as heat islands and heavier mountains absorb and retain more heat than the surroundings and therefore influences the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature from the winter minimum to the summer maximum However soil temperatures mostly remain the same on both the sides of a mountain at altitudes higher than 