Susan

Tulsa were i live was 6b until the new map. Proud to say I am now 7a whoo hoo!

and its still cold outside

Mike

I was 7b before and still am 7b. I am not surprised extreme SE OK changed to 8a. They further east you go in southern OK, the earlier they seem to warm up and they also don't cool down as fast as we do. Sometimes when a cold front comes through we'll be in the 30s and 40s here and they'll be sitting in the 60s and 70s over there in McCurtain County for a few more hours until the cold front reaches them, and even then they usually don't get nearly as cold as we do.

I think it is more important to know what your own temperatures do and how they affect your plants than to rely on a map based on averages. A person living in any zone may have a microclimate that is significantly warmer or cooler than their zone map indicares, and you have to deal with the microclimate in which you garden.

This is the second or third zone map change I can remember and I can't say it has affected how I garden or what I plant one bit. I mostly ignore the zone maps.

Dawn

I do to a certain extent, Dawn. But, when I am selecting perennials, I try to adhere to the guidelines as much as possible. Perennials, including shrubs, trees, etc., usually are priced a bit higher. I don't want to invest in something that is going to most assuredly fail if I pick even a half zone warmer.

I do have a microclimate of sorts in my yard, surrounded by two huge pines, and nestled within a concrete border of the two sidewalks, two driveways, and a concrete sort of retaining wall on one side running half the length of the yard. Tucked in this area is my small gardening area (it probably only totals about 100 sf., and the boughs of the pine trees hold off a lot of the cold. My soil never freezes, even in the coldest of winters.

Still, I took most of my zone pushing risks early in my gardening adventures, and I don't do that very much any more.

It seems like it is getting more and more difficult to find plants that will tolerate our heat and humidity in the summer, and our frigid, dry, winter winds. We want a plant that will survive a zone 3 winter, but not melt in a zone 9 or 10 summer. Geez!

I was just surprised to see that what used to be a zone 7b that extended down to the DFW area, is now all zone 8a. That's pretty dramatic IMO. I understand some shifts from a half zone colder to a half zone warmer, but that's quite a huge difference when you consider how many miles that encompasses in the Northern part of Texas, global warming aside.

Susan