Didn′t find related topics or similar questions (I hope I didn′t search too poorly), so:
why do I find only Flame Atronachs roaming Skyrim and not Frost or Storm Atronachs too?
I thought Flame Atronachs were to be found in the vulcaneous area, Frost Atronachs in the glaciers and the Storm ones in the hills of the Reach. But no. Your thoughts?

What level are you?

I only ever come across lone flame atronachs in the wild.. Ive done my fair share of hiking round the snowy parts of skyrim and never come across a lone frost atronach

I wonderd about this aswell i always thought some lowleveled mage perma summoned a flamed atronach but he was to weak and his summoned killed him and now it roams the land.

This might as well be it. In at least some of my encounters with atronachs, I would locate the corpse of such a mage nearby -unless I started seeing things lately

Now i think back, everytime ive come across a flame atronach roaming the wilderness its keeper has always been nearby, either dead or fighting off somebody else just round the corner

Come to think of it... ive only ever come across one lone flame atronach on a road and i definitely didnt see any corpses anywhere nor any signs of a recent battle. Most likely a permanent flame atronach who lost his mage awhile back and was left to roam the lands all alone.

I always thought if the mage who sumoned the atronach died, the atronach wouldnt move away from the corpse as it has nobody to follow.....

Ahh man i dont know... is there lone flame atronachs around skyrim? or do they have to be summoned to even exist?

Im not sure but im pretty sure ive found a storm atronach in the reach nearby markarth.i think

I hardly ever see mages summon a storm atronach. I can only remember esbern the crazy mage u save from the ratways summoning a storm atronach and that was a rare sight cus he bums his frost atronachs lol

Technically lore has two types of atronach. Magical constructs animated by a mage and elemental beings originating from pocket realms in Oblivion.
The first type has not been seen since Daggerfall and can be said to have been replaced by necromantic creatures, the undead such as Bonewalkers, Zombies and Draugr.

The type of atronach present since Morrowind is the elemental type and they are technically daedra.
They come from elemental minor planes of Oblivion not associated with any Prince. They are often used by summoners and Princes though.
On Tamriel, where Skyrim is, atronachs have to be summoned, they can not cross from Oblivion to Skyrim on their own.
The world created by the Aedra is protected from such intrusions, Martin Septim from the game Oblivion sacrificed himself to keep this protection active and reinforce it.

If this is reflected by game mechanics I dont know.
Ive seen a lot of Flame Atronachs out in the wild, often together with a dead Hagraven, Hag or other magic user near but often I havent seen a body as well.
I know of at least one instance in the game where there is a Frost Atrronach and I have seen one Storm Atronach as well (that are not summoned but always there) but those are both indoor locations.

I have 4 chars, everyone is higher than lvl 20, one is over 40. Anyway now that I remember, as you people said, there were some Flame Atronachs with their "keeper" lying dead somewhere nearby but not always. But usually, if you kill their summoner, the summoned creature disappears so maybe the ones roaming Skyrim come from some kind of a ritual, like with the Atronach Forge. Only time I encountered a "not summoned" Frost Atronach was in Labyrinthian.

This sounds about right ..

You can occasionally see Vigilants fighting any kind of atronach. I've seen them battling all three, at one point or another.

They usually win also, not like the witches/hags/mages etc.

= D

Mostly because there's two of them I think.

Interesting, I only recall to have found Vigilants fighting a Flame Atronach, skeletons or vampires, not the other Atronachs.