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I always thought hardiness zones were kinda stupid. What other system would put Vancouver BC, Scotland and Tampa in the same category?
No matter how mild the lows in Vancouver or Edinburgh are, you just can't grow the same tropical flora there that you can in Tampa.
Hardiness zones aren't really supposed to tell you if a particular plant is well suited to a certain area's climate, just whether or not it's likely to survive the low temperatures in the winter. That's why they always describe plants as "hardy to zone 10" and not "well suited for zone 10." It's just one tool, it's not supposed to be all-encompassing. It isn't really feasible to create a single all-encompassing tool to determine where plants can thrive.
Some Balsam Fir trees that were small did not survive the drought and heat here a couple summers ago here. They were planted a bit south of their typical range but do well in zone 4 most of the time. Extreme weather events are becoming far more common and hardiness zones are another tool we use as an average.
I have to get my camera from someone, otherwise i have been wanting to take pictures of the F.I.T. Botanical Gardens in Melbourne, FL just a few miles north of me, the USDA maps say we are a 9b but i would say no, i have had this discussion with my neighbor as well, he seems to believe we are 9a .......
I tried to explain that a year where it drops to 28F does not make eight winters of nothing under 30F wrong, the normal lowest low does not go below 30, i checked the data, he just looked at a map like most do.
Melbourne, FL is definitely not in 9a. If temperatures do not drop below 30 or 28, you would be in 9b, borderline 10a.
I wonder how Eire PA is in the same zone as southern NJ . That just isn't right in my opinion. Eire must be classified with Cleveland and Buffalo, not Philadelphia.
It's not in the same zone. Eire (based on where it is located) sounds like a 5b/6a city. Southern New Jersey is 7a (borderline 7b)
NE Tennessee - officially, we are right on the zone 6B / 7A border. I would say 7a was more like it until this past winter, when temperatures were drastically below normal. We had lows as cold as 30 degrees below average a couple of times in February!
I think we're squarely in zone 5b/6a based on historical records and annual averages.
The fun part is looking at year-over-year records where we have theoretically fallen anywhere from zone 4a to zone 8a depending on that particular year's temperatures.
The extremes for my town are -30º and 107º, but we have many years in the record books that failed to fall below 0º and that have failed to reach or exceed 100º. We had a very mild year last season - with few extremes of heat or cold - and I was able to squeeze in a growing season of about 210 days (late March through early November), which included a handful of light frost days at the very beginning and very end of the season. I do not use row covers or a greenhouse, but if I did, I could've easily extended my full season another 2-4 weeks. People I know who have been gardening for many years in my area have seen seasons as short as 100 days (early June through early September). Average for Denver/Boulder is ~155 days.
It's not in the same zone. Eire (based on where it is located) sounds like a 5b/6a city. Southern New Jersey is 7a (borderline 7b)
I'm pretty sure its a 7a location being protected from extreme cold by Lake Erie, similar for the North side of the lake around Leamington and Pelee island Ontario.
Borderline between 9b and 10a... I'm about an hour north of where I need to be to grow everything I really like. I do get some of it though, Coconut palms probably wouldn't be a good bet here long term but royals seem to do fine.
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. That just isn't right in my opinion. Eire must be classified with Cleveland and Buffalo, not Philadelphia.
