Regional variability of temperature extremes in the maritime climate of Turkey: a case study to develop agricultural adaptation strategies under climate change

Impacts of extreme weather events are relevant for regional economies and in particular societies. In this study, four temperature indices analyzed from 15 coastal weather stations during the period of 1961–2016. Observation records indicate that the diurnal temperature range has decreased in the last decades because of changes in the lower difference between the minimum and maximum temperatures. All of the studied meteorological stations in coastal regions have shown a negative trend in the cold spell duration and a positive trend in the warm spell duration. The trend analysis has shown a greater increase in the warm spell duration for lower latitude as well as a greater decrease in the cold spell duration for higher latitude over the analyzed period. Because of this behavior, these stations categorized into two large groups. The southern coastal region is somewhat wet and warm climate, this caused the diurnal temperature range has not been much enough for the agricultural production process which need enough differences between daytime base maximum and nighttime base minimum of the temperatures. As a result, the growth season length has increased by 1 day on the southern coastal region compared to the northern coastal region over Turkey during the last decades.