USDA's new Plant Hardiness Zone Map reflects warmer winters

A new Plant Hardiness Zone Map released by the federal government Wednesday shows that temperatures across the country are getting warmer and could affect gardens and crops.
The map is designed to help the estimated 80 million gardeners in this country, as well as farmers and horticulture businesses, identify where and when plants grow best by breaking up geographical areas into 26 zones.
It's the first time since 1990 that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has updated the map. The new one offers an interactive format and looks at 30 years of weather patterns, showing that in some cases - Ohio, Nebraska and Texas - nearly entire states have been updated to warmer zones. Even California's temperate climate has seen change, with a number of communities in the Bay Area also being shifted to warmer zones.

The USDA is attributing the zone modifications to better data and technology. The new map also takes into account topography - slope, elevation, prevailing winds and proximity to water - for the first time.

More here: http://news.consumerreports.org/home/2012/01/usda-updates-plant-hardiness-zone-map.html
here to find your USDA new zone: http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/#

I was just going to post the same info

You just have to enter your zip code to see if your zone has changed - mine remains the same, which is a shame because I would like to move to Gergia without the hassle of all the packing.... LOL

Mine is also the same zone.

Ours changed to 10A, I can't say the winters are warmer.

My zone changed from 8b to 7a. However, that's still not accurate because last winter it went to -9 every night for almost a week, so that would be zone 6a. I lost so many of my perennial shrubs that my lot looks sort of devastated this year so I'm searching for hardy perennials that are listed to at least zone 5 to be safe and not suffer the loss of my plants again. They should also do a hardiness zone map for heat since our summers changed from an average of 90-100 to shooting up to 117 and the winds in spring average 60 mph went to 70 and now lasted instead of just March but from February to May! They're predicting the same devastating drought again this year. The extremes here are so hard to deal with that I've changed the way I'm going to garden from now on. I got a greenhouse and I built five 2-ft high raised beds that I'm insulating with tekfoil so the roots won't burn and installing brackets on the sides so I can cover them with plastic for the winds, remay for the frosts and shade cloth for the summer! I built them so high because the ground survey says that there is less than 1% of organic matter down 72" which is as far as they checked and for the last four years here I've been adding tons of organic matter and by the next season, it's completely gone and it's back to rocky dust so I've lined the beds with commercial weed cloth to keep the bermuda grass out and try to keep the lovely stuff I'm filling them with to stay there!

PrissyJo, I thought gardening here was a challenge, but compared to your climate ours is a piece of cake! Our summer was much hotter than normal last year, but down here what is normal? We are so at the mercy of highs and lows moving across the rest of the country and whatever the Gulf of Mexico wants to send our way plus el nino/la nina. We had 3/4 inch of rain yesterday, still in a drought, but every little bit helps.

And they say I am no longer an 8a. Now in 8b but I'm not going to make the change.

If we wait a little bit, it will change again and I'll probably be going to a zone 7. Oh well....

PrissyJo bless your heart for your dedication! I wish you much luck-you deserve success after all your trials!

Calalily-- the pictures of your gardens that you post make it look so easy!! I remember that one post you did many months ago where you showed a bunch of pictures. It was phenomenal. I didn't even know you had it hard! Oh, I would dearly LOVE 3/4" of rain!

Honeybee-- that was funny! But I lived in Georgia for 15 years and NC is a much better gardening state IMHO... and your gardens are too pretty to deny this! By the way, I've been trying to do what you did about bermuda for a couple of years now but it just won't work, I dug and picked out every single little white root that was there but it kept coming back and then I found out why: a man told me (he had commercial digging equipment) that he was putting a fence in and was digging really deep and decided to go down as far as the roots of the bermuda he had and after going down five feet, he gave up, the roots were still going strong! Can you believe it!

pod -- I've really appreciated all of the info and insight you put up about drought gardening! It has helped me a lot and I'm putting a lot of it to good use.

dr -- Thanks for putting that link up. Sometimes I think the gov is so behind the times though. My dh works for them! The link to the soil survey which was active last week can't seem to come up anymore but maybe they'll fix it and you can go and check out your particular yard for what kind of soil you have. It's http://soils.usda.gov/survey. Hope it starts working again soon. But they said that my soil was good for three things: 1. Burial of nuclear waste. 2. helpicopter landings and 3. cattle grazing. Well, the first two are probably right and the cattle grazing used to be right but the NM ranchers had to sell off so much of their herds last year because of the drought and the high cost of feed.

Thank you homers!

PrissyJo - thanks for the heads-up on gardening in Georgia. I'm not in a hurry to move anywhere, but my daughter keeps hinting that she wants to move to Europe. If she does, I'll be looking to move away from city life.

PrissyJo ~ thanks for the kind words...
I really believe that will be an unpleasant issue for all to deal with eventually.
I hope you will share your experiences as well. Kristi

Hubby and I had a "discussion" this morning about the new hardiness zones. According to the local paper, most of our County is now zone 8a - but when I type in our zip code at the USDA's web site it says 7b.

I guess hubby and I will have to "discuss" it some more! LOL

I wish the site would tell us the new first and last frost dates, too!

I have started thinking that I care very little what the average winter low is. I don;t care that much whether something is likely to be killed in HALF of all winters, or 40%, or 60% of all winters.

If I was being reaosnable, I would try to figure out what the "10% likely winter low" is, so I could look for things that would only die every tenth year ... then it might be practical to protct them a lot that year.

Of course, I'm not reasonable, I'll try to start whatever "looks good" and might survive. Or might reseed.

In 1989 we were 18F, I think that was an all time low. This freeze burst pipes, killed mature citrus trees, palm trees, poinciana trees..........lots of plants bit the dust. In 2004 we had snow for the first time in 108 years, in 2010 we had a freeze in January, In 2011 we had a bad freeze in February( more than 24 hours below freezing) that killed palm trees and papayas and froze many tender trees back to ground level. I do not think we are getting warmer!
We replaced the tender palms with hardier varieties, replaced the large papaya trees with fig trees, replaced tender Indian Laurels with tougher trees. The poincianas I did not replace, but half of the ones I had are coming back from the roots. The citrus trees came thru with minimal damage to the trees, but fruit was lost. This year's crop weight is down all across the valley.

The estimates of global climate change are based on averages across the entire planet. It is completely to be expected that warmer temperatures in some areas (especially the oceans) result in some dramatic changes in weather patterns, including wider extremes from season to season and year to year. Where winters are colder, as they are right now in Eastern Europe, it is the proximate cause of the cold blasts - arctic air masses being pushed out of their "normal" winter patterns - that may be indicative of the larger changes that are occurring worldwide.

Note that I did not say "man-made" change. I am still not convinced that mankind is the sole driving force behind the observed changes. The earth has a very long history of changes that have often occurred in rapid spurts, and some of these are still unexplained.

-Rich

Umean we aren't responsible for the dinosaurs going extinct? Lol

Heck, the Cambrian-Ordovician event was way before the dinosaurs showed up (about 488 million years ago), and wiped out something like 90% of life on the planet. Many areas show teaming life in lower layers of ancient ocean sediment followed by almost nothing in the layers just above, representing hundreds of thousands to millions of years. That was preceded by the End Botomian extinction event around 517 million years ago, and the Dresbachian event about 502 million years ago, both of which "were probably worse" (we just don't have much fossil evidence because of the time span and because life forms were so much simpler).

The Permian–Triassic extinction event was MUCH later - 252.28 million years ago - and took out 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species. The Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event, which finished the dinosaurs, didn't occur until approximately 65.5 million years ago, and left mammals in a position to eventually become the dominant life form. I'm leaving out the Late Devonian and Triassic–Jurassic extinction events because, even though they are considered "major", they were much smaller than the others.

In fact, the main recurring pattern of life on earth has been the periodic mass extinctions, with the dominant species wiped out and replaced by something completely unrelated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_events has a nice chart without a lot of the technical lingo.

The current "extinction event" is relatively minor by comparison - unless we happen to be one of the species that goes extinct, that is! ;o) Don't you sort of wonder what will come next?

-Rich

I saw a graph in an issue of Oceanus, say 15-20 years ago. Just a simple plot of % CO2 in the air.

On a large scale, it was like a hockey stick laying on the ground - flat and very close to the floor throughout history, then a sharp angle and an up-slope since industrialization (the burning of coal and oil in industrial quantities plus maybe some accelerated deforestation).

When i saw how much the change was, my question became "How can you change heat retention THAT much and not see a resulting climate chnage?".

Before I saw that graph, I didn't have a string opinion whether the concern was hoopla or real. But the numbers were like an elephant in a phone booth: not something I could ignore. Since I saw that graph, my only questions have been "Why don't we already see huge effects?" and "How bad will it be?"

(Plus some Science Fiction wishfull thinking: "Maybe we WERE going into an Ice Age in the 1800s, but man-made CO2 is holding back the glaciers!"

The fact that weather changes were not gross and obvious 15-20 years ago says that the Earth has a LOT of inertia!

And I think it is TERRIFYING that there have abrupt, sudden climate changes in geological hostory, even without "step function inputs" such as industry now priovdes.

That 'flip-flop' behavior says to me that, once climate change becomes obvious enough to be undeniable even to Republicans, we might be only a few decades away from "Science Fiction-like" results, i.e. coastal flooding and regional drought and famine.

In other words, too late to fix it without corrective action 10 times more severe than would have been needed 20 years ago.

Just my opinion.

Tell me, please, did the scale (the horizontal part of the stick) start at zero? I don't think so. If an actual linear graph of CO2 concentration over time did look like a hockey stick, it would have to be a hockey stick suspended in mid-air about two stories up.

And when exactly do you think we acquired the practical ability to measure average global concentrations of atmospheric CO2? 'Cause I think the phrase "throughout history" needs just a little clarification...

You can use statistics to prove anything. Anything at all.

-Rich

hmmmph, if you had chickens, you would know that they are oxygen deprived raptors...what extinct?

>> Tell me, please, did the scale (the horizontal part of the stick) start at zero?

Very obviously not. We did not invent CO2. Here's a link for current COs measurements, ramping up from 310 ppm to 380 ppm just between 1960 and 2009.
More than 1 ppm per year. Does that curve look to you like it's deflecting upwards, despite the Kyoto Protocol?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth's_atmosphere

Say, today, 385 ppm.

Look at some of the links below: swings from Ice Ages to interglacials going back 800,000 years were mostly 190-250 ppm, and someone picked "230" as a median number.. With very rare events going up to 280 to 290 ppm.

And now we've pushed "230" up to 385 ppm in just a few centuries.

So we are now 155 ppm above the grand historical average, or 95-135 ppm above the very highest peaks that EVER occurred in past climactic extremes!

The change we have caused is an increase of 67% above the grand average, and it is even 32% to 54% above the very highest concentrations of CO2 that ever occurred in the last 800,000 years.

This is not theory or statistics, those are direct measurements.
Nothing subtle or arguable. Those are measured facts.
Such a huge change that it is unarguable.

If anyone honestly thinks that doubling the CO2 concentration won’t have much effect on climate, I want to smoke some of what they are smoking.

>> it would have to be a hockey stick suspended in mid-air about two stories up.

No, if the blade of a hockey stick rises 6" above the handle, the graph would be "suspended" around 1 foot up, not two stories.

Even more frighteningly, I would have guessed that the climate was sensitive to fairly small changes. From a pure guess based on no more than "it's a complicated system", I would have worried about a 5-10% change, and wondered about a 3% change. People who worry about the solar constant talk about fractions of one percent. (nervous liaughter)

But 67% above norm? And 32-54% above the highest concentration EVER recorded? I'm not just scared, I'm plotzing. We aren't gambling with our grandchildren's lives, we're betting on the long shot that "maybe nothing will happen if we keep pouring more gasoline on the basement floor".

But that's politics; never admit anything that might cut into a campaign donor's profits this quarter.


>> And when exactly do you think we acquired the practical ability to measure average global concentrations of atmospheric CO2?
>> 'Cause I think the phrase "throughout history" needs just a little clarification...

True, "history" is usually used to mean "recorded history".
I should have said "going back hundreds of thousands of years into pre-history".
Geologic history. The kind that is relevant to climate change: multiple glacial cycles.

CO2 in air bubbles trapped in glaciers.
Ice cores with climate data and CO2 ppm data going back 800,000 years, say eight glacial cycles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_core
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Co2_glacial_cycles_800k.png

Heres's another link showing measurements going back 420,000 years, showing the very obvious correlation between CO2 and temperature.
http://www.daviesand.com/Choices/Precautionary_Planning/New_Data/

Those are direct measurements of CO2 in air bubbles, not statistics as you suggest.

There are other sources of information about climate - data that agree with and indirectly support the direct measurments: tree rings, sediments, pollen in sediments, isotope ratios, sometimes called climate "proxies".

The proxies are not immediately direct measurements of climate, but they obviously correlate with the theory that man-made CO2 increases ARE changing weather and WILL change climate. Those proxies are "good science", not an attempt to "prove anything. Anything at all" as you suggest.

Are you sure you have an open mind on this issue? I don't want to increase the level of contentiousness, but it is also true that one can "deny anything - anything at all" by denying the observed data.

I also started out skeptical about "those hippy theories" until I looked at even a little data, and to me it was obvious, 15-20 years ago, that we SHOULD be seeing a HUGE climactic response in the "near" future, and I only wondered whether "near" was years, decades or centuries. The greenhouse effect is simple high school physics. It doesn’t take a lot of data when the input cause (CO2 chnage) is huge and the correlation is obvious. But, 30 years later, we DO have a lot of data, and it all hangs together and supports the obvious conclusion.

Weather and climate are NOT simple, but this effect is not going to be subtle - it's more like "if you add a lot of insulation to a pot on the stove, will it get hotter?"

Since the 80s, the statistical data about current weather (as distinct from long-term climate) has gone from "inconclusive" to "maybe indicative" to "strongly suggestive" to "pretty clear". One scary thing is that UTTERLY UNDENIABLE changes in today's weather might not occur until we're in the irreversible phase of very rapid change: like the up-angle going into an interglacial, except that we are ALREADY IN an interglacial.

My impression is that, by now, almost every professional researcher in climate science who isn't owned by oil companies, considers the weather statistics to be somewhere between "strongly suggestive" and "dead obvious".

I know many politicians are in denial or lying, but I didn't think any reputable climatologists had any doubts left except "how soon" and "how severe".

My own guess is that climate change will get severe enough to cause regional famines and mass migrations or mass deaths, in 20-100 years. Or we might geet "lucky" and have the dust from all the new deserts add enough particulates to the upper atmosphere to mitigate the effect.

But I wonder how fragile industrial civilization is, and whether we will get into regional and global wars when, say, 10% of the world is starving or trying to relocate into someone else's real estate? I don;t think the climate will kill as many as the resulting wars.

I hope there are some scientists left to record what happens when a nuclear winter combines with 500 ppm of CO2!

I want to meet the guy who was around 800,000 years ago taking and measuring atmospheric CO2 samples from random locations around the globe.

PS: you didn't go back far enough. 800,000 years is a drop in the bucket.

PPS: If you feel so strongly about it, quit complainin' and go plant something green! I own 31 acres in Georgia that are doing nothing but sucking up CO2 and turning it into trees. That's their entire job; no driveways, no utilities, no structures. No "planted pine", just native mixed species. I have paid the property taxes for the past 30+ years (something in the $30K-$35K range altogether) so that they could continue to sequester CO2 and provide habitat for wildlife, contribute to natural diversity, etc. I try to get up to see it every few years, but I hate burning the gas to make the trip, so it's been over 6 years since I was last there.

-Rich

I know what an ice core is. There are a lot of interesting things that can be found in old ice cores, things like particulates of dust and ash, that give us an indication of things that happened in the distant past - droughts, volcanic eruptions, meteor impacts, etc.

But CO2 dissolves in water. The colder the water, the more gasses dissolve. Gases also dissipate through permeable materials like ice. Those bubbles aren't in case-hardened steel - they're in solid phase water. How much do you think the gases can dissolve and dissipate in 800,000 years? Ice cores are, by logical definition, collected in areas that have been continuously frozen, so there is no representation of tropical conditions. They are not global measurements.

Yes, in case you're wondering, I am questioning the basic research. I am also questioning where the funding is coming from, in part because an astounding amount of "global warming" research has been funded by the sort of people who stand to make money out of convincing other people that we've created a problem.

Some even want to sell us "carbon credits" - as if they had any to sell, or any right to sell them. Talk about the ultimate snake oil! You don't even have to give anything in return for the money! Ask Algore; he'll gladly sell you some carbon credits.

P.S.: tomorrow night's low in Gainesville FL: 27. Sunday night's low: 24. Average lows for mid-February going back over 100 years: mid-40's. Have to bring in a few dozen plants again that should have been fine outside, dismantle the drip irrigation system, drip the spigots and cover vegetables. Glad the figs are still in deep dormancy, and at least the apple and pear buds haven't broken yet. Six inches of new growth on the loquats is probably toast - I don't have enough material to cover everything that's started growing.

-Rich

Only thing I can add, is it only takes one good freeze after you have put your tender plants out to wipe out your whole garden. I have found they have had my area too warm on their maps and I have to buy plants hardy enough for one zone colder or risk losing them already. Now they have me border line with the next one warmer. I'll wait and see.

All these numbers and stats are getting to be too much for me- Think I'll wander over to the places where the talk is easier to understand and put to my use.

Looks like today might be a good day to test the warming of zones.
Zero here this morning. Like to see Zone 5 plants trying to live here today!

Well, they moved me to zone 6 from 5 and I have to buy zone 4s now or risk losing them. If they average it out, it just doesn't work for those really cold nights.

NOAA just dropped our predicted overnight low to 23ºF for tonight and tomorrow. All around this area there are trees in full bloom and with several inches of new growth that won't be there by Monday. New growth on many is so far along that trying to cover with cloth just snaps it off.

-Rich

I'm on the very edge of 6a now...about a whole mile inside 6a. ......it says put your zip code in....hah! my zip code is different than me.

Anybody that has lived in their place for a time should know what works there. Forget about the stupid zone map.
Minnesota needs zone 2, 3, & 4 plants, anything else is called a house plant!

Bernie-my kids are wondering why I'm looking at the iPad and laughing so hard. Well said! For me it's not the type of plants but knowing when to plant out so I don't kill my plants or have them stunted by temps that are too cold.

After the last 2 winters I'm surprised that they warmed things up. We may get in the teens tonight. It has taken me having remote thermometer and one in my truck to realize that we are usually 7* colder then DT Liberty Hill, and 15* cooler then Austin. Sometimes, when driving all the road has to do is change elevation and the thermometer reads 32*. it doesn't seem like much difference but it is when it comes to plants.

If you know your area trust yourself and forget the map. I have seen more difference with in the zones then between them.

I agree- Most times a good dose of common sense is the best thing.

What you all said is true, but what about whoever marks the plants?? If they are changing the zones on the plants?????? i.e. I am a zone 5a. Been buying zone 4 plants. So, those zone 4 plants are going to read zone 5 now? They moved me to zone 6.

Confused as Jo :0)

I guess I've never bought plants for a certain zone. If it can't take freezing temps it's a container plant or I grow it as an annual. Since I grow almost all edibles except for some natives, I have never really thought about it that way. The tropicals and cactus/succulents are in the house during the winter.

I grow more by what the plant requires then by suggested zone.

:0) 1lisac, if I lived in Texas and grew cactus/succulents I wouldn't worry so much about zones either. I can understand growing everything else as annuals. I guess.

Jnette-what kind of plants are you talking about? Believe it or not I grow most of the cactus inside because many of them can't take the freezing temps. In our area they grow grapes, a little further south they grow peaches. I'm in the Hill Country so it's not flat with tumble weeds everywhere.

The zones are actually for overwintering perennials.
Nothing to do when you can plant out annuals. That goes by last frost date.
We are safe to plant out tomatoes, peppers, melons & tender flowers any time after Memorial Day.

You don't have plants like evergreens, Rhododendrons, Camellias, roses, needle trees, etc. Those are the plants that we worry about hardiness zones. How cold it gets. Fruit trees like apples, and like the peaches you mention. There MIGHT be some cactus or succulents that some people can grow, with protection such as heavy mulches, wraps etc.

There is nothing cut and dried where it is yes or no on ALL deciduous plants or trees etc. If that were the case, where would the cutoff be? If that were the case, there would be no reason to have zones. Either hot or cold. Everything would be an annual. No such thing as perennials. Or weeds. Grasses, etc.

One more things about living in an area long enough to know so trust your instincts. Why is it then that they bother hybridizing plants to make them so they can survive in a colder zone if we are just going to reject them without trying them?

eople in Texas can't say what to grow in Washington or the other way around.
Also just to mess with your head there are micro zones everywhere. Along a river or lake for example. Hilltops or valleys.
Minnesota can't grow peaches, but we sure can grow great apples!
How about rhubarb, I know that won't grow in Texas. Or Tulips, they don't work in hot climate either.