To rationally guide agricultural production, protect ecological environment and explore how much soil temperature responds to climate change, a study was performed to systematically analyze temporal variation and extreme value of shallow soil temperature and their relationships with air temperature based on the observatory data, accumulated during 1961—2013, of the daily shallow soil temperature (0、5、10、15、20 cm) and annual air temperature in the middle (Wuwei) and lower (Minqin) reaches of the Shiyang River Basin, using the linear trend method, variance analysis method, accumulative anomaly method, and correlation coefficient method. Results show that in that region the decade and annual shallow soil temperature displayed a very significant rising trend, particularly, in the first 13 years of the twenty-first century; climate tendency rate was greater in the middle reaches than in the lower reaches, and climate tendency coefficients all passed the α=0.01 significant level test. Annual mean of shallow soil temperature was higher in the middle reaches than in the lower reaches. In the chronology of shallow soil temperature existed 4~6 year paracycles of variation for both middle and lower reaches. Sudden change in shallow soil temperature occurred in 1996 in the middle reaches and in 1985 and 1996 in the lower reaches. Shallow soil temperature was the highest in summer and the lowest in winter in both the middle and lower reaches, and tended to rise in all the four seasons, with climate tendency rate being in the order of spring ＞ summer ＞ autumn ＞ winter. Monthly variation of shallow soil temperature was quite consistent, with an obvious peak in July and an obvious valley in January. The annual mean air temperature was obviously in a rising trend in that region. The climate tendency rate was 0.437 ℃ 10a^-1 in the middle reaches and 0.417 ℃ 10a^-1 in the lower reaches, and climate tendency coefficients all passed the α=0.01 significant level test. Annual shallow soil temperature and annual air temperature were in an extremely significant positive relationship, with correlation coefficients passing the α=0.001significance level test, indicating that air temperature has a positive effect on shallow soil temperature . Annual air temperature and shallow soil temperature showed a similar pattern of variation. It is quite obvious that annual variation of air temperature has a remarkable positive effect on annual variation of shallow soil temperature. The increase in shallow soil temperature may be explained as its response to the rising air temperature, and the response is more sensitive in the lower reaches than in the middle reaches, and in spring and summer than in winter.