# Madoi County

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, bordering Sichuan to the south. Its area is about 25,000 km$^2$ (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 and Climate

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 −15.7 °C (3.7 °F) in January to 8.0 °C (46.4 °F) in July, while the annual mean is −3.33 °C (26.0 °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 332 mm (13.1 in) is delivered from June to September.
On January 2, 1978, the lowest temperature ever recorded in Qinghai was −48.1 °C (−54.6 °F) at Madoi.
Climate data for Madoi County, elevation 4,272 m (14,016 ft), (1991–2020 normals, extremes 1971–2010) :
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Record high °C (°F) | 4.2 (39.6) | 7.6 (45.7) | 11.5 (52.7) | 16.2 (61.2) | 18.7 (65.7) | 22.4 (72.3) | 24.3 (75.7) | 23.2 (73.8) | 20.2 (68.4) | 17.9 (64.2) | 6.0 (42.8) | 5.4 (41.7) | 24.3 (75.7) |
| Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | −6.7 (19.9) | −3.5 (25.7) | 0.3 (32.5) | 5.1 (41.2) | 8.7 (47.7) | 11.7 (53.1) | 14.4 (57.9) | 14.4 (57.9) | 10.8 (51.4) | 4.4 (39.9) | −1.5 (29.3) | −5.4 (22.3) | 4.4 (39.9) |
| Daily mean °C (°F) | −15.2 (4.6) | −11.8 (10.8) | −7.6 (18.3) | −2.2 (28.0) | 2.1 (35.8) | 5.8 (42.4) | 8.4 (47.1) | 8.0 (46.4) | 4.3 (39.7) | −2.3 (27.9) | −9.5 (14.9) | −14.2 (6.4) | −2.8 (26.9) |
| Mean daily minimum °C (°F) | −22.1 (−7.8) | −18.7 (−1.7) | −13.9 (7.0) | −8.3 (17.1) | −3.3 (26.1) | 0.9 (33.6) | 3.3 (37.9) | 2.9 (37.2) | −0.3 (31.5) | −6.9 (19.6) | −15.6 (3.9) | −21.1 (−6.0) | −8.6 (16.5) |
| Record low °C (°F) | −48.1 (−54.6) | −36.3 (−33.3) | −32.4 (−26.3) | −19.7 (−3.5) | −20.0 (−4.0) | −7.1 (19.2) | −3.7 (25.3) | −6.2 (20.8) | −11.4 (11.5) | −23.0 (−9.4) | −33.3 (−27.9) | −38.8 (−37.8) | −48.1 (−54.6) |
| Average precipitation mm (inches) | 4.2 (0.17) | 4.6 (0.18) | 8.9 (0.35) | 12.1 (0.48) | 35.1 (1.38) | 64.2 (2.53) | 77.3 (3.04) | 69.3 (2.73) | 47.8 (1.88) | 20.1 (0.79) | 4.7 (0.19) | 2.3 (0.09) | 350.6 (13.81) |
| Average precipitation days (≥ 0.1 mm) | 6.3 | 7.5 | 9.6 | 9.7 | 15.5 | 17.7 | 18.1 | 15.4 | 16.4 | 12.3 | 5.2 | 4.1 | 137.8 |
| Average snowy days | 9.4 | 9.9 | 13.1 | 13.0 | 17.2 | 10.7 | 4.5 | 4.1 | 11.1 | 15.6 | 7.9 | 5.8 | 122.3 |
| Average relative humidity (%) | 51 | 47 | 48 | 47 | 56 | 64 | 65 | 64 | 65 | 60 | 52 | 48 | 56 |
| Mean monthly sunshine hours | 229.3 | 213.8 | 248.2 | 261.2 | 252.4 | 216.2 | 237.7 | 237.0 | 215.5 | 241.5 | 238.5 | 236.9 | 2,828.2 |
| Percentage possible sunshine | 73 | 69 | 66 | 66 | 58 | 50 | 54 | 58 | 59 | 70 | 78 | 78 | 65 |
| Source: China Meteorological Administration ||||||||||||||

## Administrative divisions

Madoi is divided into two towns and two townships:
| Name | Simplified Chinese | Hanyu Pinyin | Tibetan | Wylie | Administrative division code |
| Towns ||||||
| Machali Town | 玛查理镇 | Mǎchálǐ Zhèn | རྨ་ཕྲ་ལི་གྲོང་བརྡལ། | rma phra li grong brdal | 632626100 |
| Zora Town (Huashixia) | 花石峡镇 | Huāshíxiá Zhèn | མཛོ་རྭ་གྲོང་རྡལ། | mdzo rwa grong rdal | 632626101 |
| Townships ||||||
| Maqu Township (Huanghe) | 黄河乡 | Huánghé Xiāng | རྨ་ཆུ་ཡུལ་ཚོ། | rma chu yul tsho | 632626200 |
| Co'gyarêng Township (Zhalinghu) | 扎陵湖乡 | Zhālínghú Xiāng | མཚོ་སྐྱ་རེངས་ཡུལ་ཚོ། | mtsho skya rengs yul tsho | 632626201 |