CONSIDERATIONS ON THE DROUGHT PHENOMENON IN CLUJ COUNTY

Considerations on the drought phenomenon in Cluj County. Cluj county area is 6674 km², and is located in the northwestern part of Romania. The climate is temperate continental with oceanic influences, relatively humid, but there are also periods of drought and even years with deficient rainfall, as there are periods of excess rainfall. Dryness and drought phenomena are caused by cosmic, climatic, hydrological (groundwater depth, the existence of surface water sources) factors, features of the underlying surface, vegetation coverage, soil texture and structure. The relief determines a climate elevation with differences in terms of precipitation and temperatures quantities. To calculate the dryness degree of the climate at weather stations in the Cluj county, the Emmanuel de Martonne aridity index was used. Drought do not induce into the substrate the geomorphologic processes per se, however, they pave the way for starting the deflation process, surface erosion and ravine, by reducing the cohesion between the particles and the formation of deep cracks in the soil and even rock. In these climatic conditions, droughts are less frequent in the county of Cluj, in relation to the extra-Carpathian regions and are distributed unevenly across the county. The number of periods of drought decreases with the increase of the altitude, from an average of 2.6 drought periods a year at Dej (altitude of 232 m) to an annual average of 0.3 draught periods at Vlădeasa Peak (altitude of 1836 m)