However, a change is taking place in the gardening world. Due to rising temperatures, half of the country is now in a different plant hardiness zone, which determines what plants thrive in an area and when to plant them. Gardeners rely on knowing their hardiness zone to make informed decisions about what to plant and when.
However, the USDA acknowledges that some of these zone shifts could be attributed to climate change, but cautions against using them as concrete evidence. According to the USDA… temperature updates to plant hardiness zones are not necessarily reflective of global climate change due to the variable nature of extreme minimum temperatures and improved mapping methods.
Chris Daly, director of the PRISM Climate Group at Oregon State University, shares a similar perspective. While acknowledging that zone shifting is expected to occur over the long run due to climate change, Daly emphasizes that it’s not always a reliable indicator of global climate change. As an example of zone shifting, Dallas, “Texas,” “was previously classified as Zone 8a.”.. but has now been shifted to Zone 8b due to changes in winter temperature data.
This topic has been extensively covered by Upworthy, providing valuable insights and information for gardeners and anyone interested in the impact of climate change on their local environment.
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In The News:
Millions of American households have a garden of some sort, whether they grow vegetables, fruits flowers or other plants. Gardening has always been a popular hobby, but more Americans turned to tending plants during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic for both stress relief and to grow their own food so they could make less trips to the store. For many people, it’s a seasonal ritual that’s therapeutic and rewarding.
But a shift is occurring in the gardening world. Now, due to rising temperature data, half the country find themselves in a different ⁘plant hardiness zone⁘ —the zones that indicate what plants work well in an area and when to plant them. Gardeners rely on knowing their hardiness zone to determine what to plant and when, but they haven’t been updated since 2012.
TheUSDA acknowledges that some of the zone shifts could be due to climate change but cautions against using them as hard evidence for it since factors such as improved data collection also contribute to changes in the map.
⁘Temperature updates to plant hardiness zones are not necessarily reflective of global climate change because of the highly variable nature of the extreme minimum temperature of the year, as well as the use of increasingly sophisticated mapping methods and the inclusion of data from more weather stations,⁘ theUSDA wrote in November 2023. ⁘Consequently, map developers involved in the project cautioned against attributing temperature updates made to some zones as reliable and accurate indicators of global climate change (which is usually based on trends in overall average temperatures recorded over long time periods).⁘
At the same time, ChrisDaly, director of the PRISM Climate Group at Oregon State University that developed the map with the USDA , told NPR, ⁘Over the long run, we will expect to see a slow shifting northward of zones as climate change takes hold.⁘
As an example of zone shifting, Dallas, Texas, was classified as Zone 8a in 2012, when data showed the coldest winter temperature in the city was between 10 and 15 degrees Fahrenheit on average. In 2023, with data showing the coldest winter temps falling between 15 and 20 degrees Fahrenheit, it’s been shifted to Zone 8b.
