"The USDA last revised it in 1990, based on data from 1974 to 1986. But the climate has changed since the mid-1980s"

During that time frame, climatologists were warning us of an imminent ice age. It was an unusually cold period, and of course it is warmer now.

Exxon/ Mobile contributes to the Arbor Day foundation. Funny, I thought that if a foundation or a scientist accepted money from that evil denier enabling corporation they could not agree with global warming. Are they telling the truth? Or just using short term data?

http://www.usna.usda.gov/Hardzone/ushzmap.html

I noticed they wisely didn't point the finger at man for the warming, refreshing for a change.

There have been several years now where farmers were able to put corn in surprisingly early. That is the good side.

On the bad side, there is an increase in pests and not just the denier type. Caterpillers and Japanese Bettles are much worse than what they used to be. Caterpillars in particular have wiped out large sections of woodlands. In some areas when they start marching around, the roads are so thick with them that cars have actually skidded. They seem to thrive in the warm and dry springs that have accompanied global warming and there are no significant natural predators. The only thing that slows them down are heavy rains, since they do not do well with mud.

With Global warming there is more precepitation, but it is mostly in the fall and winter and not the spring.

Hmmm....

I recently saw a change in this map from a greenhouse I buy plants from. I got a rather expensive plant that normally would not survive in Ohio. Planted it this spring and will now be composting the dead remains as the GW did not come through for me as promised and it croaked.

I shudder to think of the massacre of warm weather plants when us northerners plant them in the next several years. The maps should not be changed until more time passes.

Now this is a good benefit of "global warming". As a gardener previously in zone 6, moving into zone 7 will greatly increase the variety and type of plants I can grow. There were a lot of plants I avoided before, that now I can start growing. Yeah!!!! So far, I keep seeing and reading that the benefits of global warming are more on the positive side rather than the negative side.

So now the National Arbor Day Foundation has joined the Warministos, huh? They just want more funding for their bloody tree research!!! BAH!

Just kidding. ;-)

Wow, where I live has changed zones, confirming NOT a scientific study of warming, but one of my own senses. It's far warmer here now than in any other time in my life (I live in the Great Lakes region of the US.) The cause? I'll leave you all to war on that subject (that'll accomplish much, I'm sure...the evil scientists who want more funding vs. the soulless corporate money machine, etc., etc., etc...), but, regardless, to my senses, it is warmer nonetheless.

By the way, seeing this sort of strong moral split on this topic ultimately dodges the issue at hand and leaves us all at an impass, and that will never allow a solution to this problem (if, that is, you believe there IS one.) Because whether one thinks this problem is a natural system or one caused by humans, if it is left unaltered it may spell trouble for all life here as we know it. I know my lawn is crying out, even now...;-)

Let the attacks commence!

Deniers of Global Warming are once again attempting to mislead and decieve readers.

The time period from 1974 to 1986 was not unusually cool. Check out the NOAA website for factual temperatures of that period and it will become obvious that the peiod was significantly warmer than 1880 to 1920.

ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/anomalies/annual.land_and_ocean.90S.90N.df_1901-2000mean.dat

The planet exited the ice age thousands of years ago, and yet deniers think they can fool people by using this as an excuse.

Deniers seem intent to further their evil agenda by spreading what they know is wrong.

Andrew: Your caterpillars appear in cycles having nothing to do with GW. See http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/treecare/forest_health/ftc/2003.html.

Where did you get the idea that in a warmer climate most of the rain would occur in fall and winter?

Ant,

How old are you? It has been warming in much of the US since the mid 1960s, but most places in the country are no warmer or somewhat cooler than the 1930s. Is this a problem which needs "fixing" or the cyclical nature of the climate?

GC(global cooling)

I have had to adjust the plants in California also. We have had about 20yrs of below average summers in temp. and have had below average winters also in the last few.. I also have had to help my parents remove basically every plant in there yard because of the extrordinarly cold winters in the coastal areas of california. I have lived in this state all my life and the temps here are much lower then when i was younger.. If this is GW then i am not on this globe. lets cut out the bs on start quoting facts..

I can't comment on the entire map, but my growing zone was bumped up from 9B to 10. Believe it or not moving from 9 to 10 is a huge deal. It is a tipping point so to speak for many tropical and subtropical species. Knowing what I know about the history of the climate in my area I would say the move to zone 10 is premature. The new map ignores data from the 80's. That decade brought us several freezes that were far below the 30 degree limit for zone 10. Not to mention we dip below 30 degrees at least once per year. WHICH by the defintion of the growing zones would place us firmly in zone 9B. Maybe the map is correct for some regions, but it certainly is not something to use as a guide for my area. I wonder how many other areas have been over optimistically nudged up a zone or two.

Interesting, the great claim for the "+2" when the proposed "+2" areas are much smaller than the "-1" areas. Remember that for growing purposes, the zones are a guide, not a hard rule. You can go +/- one zone by using microclimating, but you do take the risk that you will lose what you are growing.

More interesting is the comparison of the 1960 and 1990 maps. 1960 was right before the last Ice Age scare and the 1990 maps show that the climate zone lines were moving south (it was getting cooler) and now they want to move them north again. Wow. In the meantime, speaking from north Florida, south Alabama and north Georgia (by personal observations and contacts), despite the claims for how "warm" the early part of 2007 supposedly was, many people lost their early crops plantings because of the multiple late cold snaps. I had to cover my apple trees in March!!!

Brett, are you allowed to say that some of this silly season stuff is just silly?

Reply: Sure I am, but I do not know all the facts in their decision process. I am a meteorologist, but not a plant expert. All you have to do is take one look at my pathetic garden. Brett

Brett:

Goto a local grain mill and get some winter rye for your garden. The big box stores don't carry rye. At the end of the growing season, you know December or so in Central PA due to of course global warming, remove all leftover plant matter and till the soil. Broadcast the rye over the entire area and cover lightly. The rye will sprout and over winter.

In spring, about February due again of course to global warming, allow the rye to get to about 8" to 10" high. Cut it down at the base and allow to "compost" for about two weeks. Then till the roots and everything into the soil. Remove big clumps of roots if they exist and then rake smooth so you can plant the garden.

Should make a huge difference in the fertility of the soil. I have mainly clayey soil here in Central Ohio and did this last winter. Before that, I put tons of effort into tilling with some compost and it did little. The rye made a big difference in production this year. I also put weed stop fabric over the whole area to innoculate the soil. Also, makes it look more tidy with no real effort.

I still think the hardiness map change is not good and will continue to plant things with a known track record for the area. Also, insect levels are down around here. Don't really know why.

Reply: Sure I am, but I do not know all the facts in their decision process. I am a meteorologist, but not a plant expert. All you have to do is take one look at my pathetic garden. Brett

Heh, the only gardening advantage I have is that I was taught how to make real good compost. You also have other duties in your paying job to deal with. OTOH, for this particular item, I didn't need to know a thing about plants, it was a simple as pulling up the old maps online and comparing them. Which is the problem with all the AGW "proofs", you look at the historical data and find out that there is nothing special about the current warming trend.

Be it the NOAA's "adjustments" to the raw data that show increasing warming or surfacestations.org proving that most of the various stations are exhibiting UHI effects (and those that are "in code" for their situation are showing cooling), all the AGW data is coming up either devoid of historical context, seriously flawed or outright lies.