Climate zones
Lee Poulsen (Fri, 28 Oct 2005 14:48:45 PDT)

Wow, Tony. This is fantastic to hear about. I had my own little private
"uproar" when I saw that initial AHS draft version.

Thanks for representing all of us "silent majority" stakeholders that
never get invited to any of these government meetings that affect us.
(I'm thinking of the "importing small lots of seeds" rule-making
meetings...)

I can't wait till it comes out or online. Any idea of when the Phase I
map will appear?

It would be really nice if the EU, Australia, New Zealand, South
Africa, Chile, Argentina, and China, for starters would submit their
temperature data to this project as well. I've seen a zone map of China
and of Australia that some people put together and a low resolution map
of Europe that someone made. But it would be nice to have full-blown
versions of these areas as well as of North America. And it would be
very informative to see true Zone maps of southern South America, South
Africa, and New Zealand as well.

--Lee Poulsen
Pasadena area, California, USDA Zone 10a

On Oct 28, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Tony Avent wrote:

John:

Work on the new USDA map began on August 18, 2004. In 2003, a draft
version was released by the American Horticulture Society which caused
quite an uproar in the horticultural community. This revision would
have
done away with the "a" and "b" zone designations and would have been
based
on a fifteen year sample (1986-2001) of climatic data. By using a
15-year
warm period sample, the draft map would have moved Chicago into zone 6
and
made other such disastrous errors.

Thanks to the support of Dr. Judy St. John of USDA-ARS, the map
revision
was put on hold until input from the stakeholders (government term for
folks most affected by government decisions) could be gathered. The
August
18 meeting included representatives from USDA- ARS, the American
Horticulture Society, the American Association of Botanic Gardens and
Arboreta, University Researchers, and representatives of the nursery
industry.

The project will consist of two phases. In Phase I, the map will be
reconstructed using the most recent 30 years of average annual extreme
minimum temperatures. The map will also retain the "a and b"
designations.
For the first time, the map will include a better breakdown of
coastal/lake
effects, urban heat islands, wind patterns, and elevation differences.
Due
to advances in interpolation algorithms, the map will pick up on small
differences that were previously missed. The map will be made
available
on-line where it can be searched both by city and zip code. The
on-line map
will be clickable for more detailed climatic data to satisfy what the
research scientists called, "those pointy-head weather nerd types."

Phase II of the project will involve overlay maps for other factors
such as
duration of cold, summer heat factors, and possibly air flow patterns.
It's
not often that I get excited about a government project, but this will
be a
huge improvement for our industry. Thanks both to the USDA-ARS for
making
their resources available and for all of the committee members for
their
time and input into the process.
Tony Avent