In the pre-19th century period, there were no names given to clouds until in 1803, an English naturalist, Luke Howard, published a cloud classification system. To this day, it still serves as the basis for our classification of clouds. Let's note the difference in these three basic families of clouds. Cirrus clouds are high, whit e, thin, and even wispy, made of tiny ice crystals. Cumulus clouds are globes of puffs and mass, even cauliflowered.
Stratus clouds are sheetlike and spread like flat layers across the sky.
However, there are variations and certain conditions that occur relative to seasonal an d latitudinal variation. At high latitudes or during cold winter months, high clouds are found in lower latitudes. There are many variations of clouds in the three major altitude categories. Aggregates of the high altitude cloud family are the cirrocumulus and cirrostratus, each taking on the basic thin, white, and icicle features associated with h igh-altitude clouds. Members of the low-lying cloud group are stratocumulus and nimbostratus.