| Fillmore County is in southeastern Minnesota. It is bounded on the south by the State of Iowa, on the north by Olmsted and Winona Counties, on the west by Mower County, and on the east by Houston County. Preston, the county seat, is almost in the geographical center of the county. The county has an approximate area of 862 square miles. It extends about 36 miles from east to west and 24 miles north from the Iowa border. | |
History
Fillmore County was
established March 5, 1853, and named for Millard Fillmore, President of the
United States from 1850 to 1853. The larger centers of population are
Spring Valley, Preston, Rushford, Chatfield, Lanesboro, Harmony and Mabel.
Early settlers in Fillmore County faced no
problems with use of land and water. Their immediate problem was to
convert the rich soil fertility Nature had built up over the centuries into
prosperous farms and thriving villages. The early cash grain economy of wheat, barley and
flax ran into trouble with insects and disease. Diversification of crops
and the marketing of livestock products soon followed. Advent of the tractor after World War I permitted
one person to farm more land, and plow right up to the fence line. The
acreage put to annual crops expanded as the horses were replaced by tractors,
because less hay and pasture were needed. During the 1920's and 1930's, serious erosion
damage became evident on the many sloping fields. Flood channels gullied
out in many places, and silt and debris accumulated on bottom land.
Since 1940, farm owners have made a concrete
effort to check unnecessary erosion and runoff and have gone a long way toward
controlling this deterioration of soil and wasteful deposition.
Topography
Topography influences soil formation
through its effect on water relations, erosion, temperature relations, and plant
cover. The topographic features of an area are determined by the
underlying bedrock formations, climate, vegetation, and other factors. The
effect of topography on the soil is dependent, to a large extent, on the other
four factors of soil formations.
Topography affects thickness and organic-matter
content of the A horizons, depth of solum, drainage (especially coloration and
degree of mottling), and degree of horizon differentiation. For example,
soils derived from the kink of parent material will classify as Lithosols on the
steeper slopes, but as the slope decreases, will successively be darker and
deeper and have increasingly more clayey subsoils.
On the broad divides of the dissected upland
areas, deep soils with well-developed horizons have formed. Shallower,
less well developed soils derived from loess and a variety of sedimentary rocks
occupy the valley slopes. On the valley floor are young soils developed
from alluvium that washed from the adjacent uplands.
(Elevation
map of Fillmore County)
Climate
Fillmore County has a typical continental
climate characterized by wide variations in temperature, scanty winter
precipitation, normally ample summer rainfall, and a general tendency to
extremes. The average growing season is 137 days. The average annual
temperature is 43.7 degrees F. January, the coldest month, has an average
temperature of 12.5 degrees, and July, the warmest month, has an average
temperature of 71.6 degrees. The difference between the average winter and
summer temperatures is 53.7 degrees F. Precipitation is highest during the
growing season. The average annual precipitation is 31.49 inches.
June is normally the wettest month. Thunderstorms supply most of the rain
in the warm months. The county is in the southeastern part of the State,
where there is an average of 37 thunderstorms a year. At least one
damaging rainstorm comes in summer. Tornadoes and ice storms occur
occasionally. The average snowfall is 44.4 inches.
The above information was taken from the United State Department of Agriculture Soil Survey.
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