Patty, I look up mine from Western Gardener's handbook. The book is informative and cheap.

Too bad, the sunset zone maps are not available in the internet, for obvious reasons.

Here's the link to the magazine:
http://www.backyardgardener.com/zone/#sunset

Quoted from that page:

Quote:

Sunset Zones versus USDA Zones Gardeners in the western United States sometimes are confused when confronted with the 11 Hardiness Zones created by the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture), because they are used to a 24-zone climate system created 40 years ago by Sunset Magazine. The Sunset zone maps, which cover 13 Western states, are much more precise than the USDA's, since they factor in not only winter minimum temperatures, but also summer highs, lengths of growing seasons, humidity, and rainfall patterns to provide a more accurate picture of what will grow there. If you live in the western U.S., you'll find that nurseries, garden centers, and other western gardeners usually refer to the Sunset climate zones rather than the USDA plant hardiness zones. In fact, the Sunset zones and maps are what are listed for each plant in Sunset's Western Garden Book and Western Garden CD-ROM, which are considered the standard gardening references in the West. However, the USDA zones are still of importance to western gardeners, since the USDA zones are used in the rest of the country. When you order plants from catalogs or read general garden books, you need to know your USDA zone in order to be able to interpret references correctly. To determine your USDA zone, use the links above.

Joe,

I found this online. I believe this the list of Sunset zones. I don't have the Wester Gardener's handbook so I can't verify that these are the zone charts you're talking about. Could you tell us if this is it?

http://homegarden.move.com/homegarden/gardening/landscaping/zones/climate/index.asp?poe=homestore

If you click on the map, it zooms in on your region and then you can find and read about your current zone.

Pelham

Thanks for the link Pelham. the map though is very rough and doesn't show my city but I can estimate where it is on the map and it shows zone 14:

"ZONE 14. Inland Northern and Central California with Some Ocean Influence
Growing season: early Mar. to mid-Nov., with rain coming in the remaining months. Periodic intrusions of marine air temper summer heat and winter cold (lows run from 26 degrees to 16 degrees F/-3 degrees to -9 degrees C). Mediterranean-climate plants are at home here."

Thanks Pelham,

It is interesting that the USDA map divides the Florida Panhandle into zones 8 and 9 while the Sunset map which has many more zones overall puts it all in zone 28. The bottom half of this county gets considerably less frost being near the water.

Skeet

The last five years, our lows ran from 20 to 31 deg F, instead of the published Sunset Zone data of 16 to 26 deg F. We have gone warmer.

We were in zone 9 then 8 after the revision in the 90's, now we're back in 9.

We occasionally have unprotected plants such as peppers make it through the winter, but most years we have that one freeze that gets into the upper 20's.

Bannana's have to make it through the winter to make fruit, but that has only happened a couple times in the past 10 yrs.

What is scary about global climate change is what we know least about---rainfall. I don't know what rainfall has been like elsewhere, but along the Gulf Coast we have been having a lot of very dry years. This year is one of them, we are over 20 inches below normal so far this year.

2000 and 2001 were record droughts-- trees were actually dying from lack of water.

When I was in high school, Mobile, AL had an annual average of 88 inches-- it was the wettest place in the continental US. I think that claim now belongs to Mt Washington NH while Mobile rainfall has dropped to 65 inches.

Skeet

I know exactly what's going to happen to rainfall patterns. I don't where specifically it is going to fall, but it is really going to get more intense. Simple physics about the air. In simple layman's terms, the warmer air can carry more moisture, so that when it condenses as rain, it will really be more intense.

In a little bit more bookish terms, if you look at the psychrometric charts showing the saturation vapor pressure versus the dry bulb temperature and the amount of water that air can carry, you notice that the saturation vapor pressure curve is exponential. A 1 F degree increase at 100 deg F has tremendously more dramatic increase in the moisture capacity than a 1 F degree increase at 40 deg F.

I know you are right about the ability of air to hold more moisture, but will it release that moisture in the form of rain. I can't help but think about a nature movie on the Namib desert with clouds rolling in only to dissappear into the air.

I have heard some suggestions that deserts areas will increase, especially along the mid lattitudes. Of course, rainfall may increase in other areas.

-- Skeet

The dynamics and intensity in global terms will increase, the main reason why Hurricanes will only get stronger because of the air's increased capacity to carry moisture with increased temperature. For now, we are not yet in the point where moisture as it condenses will evaporate because of very high atmospheric temperature. We are not in that range, but even so, even in high temperature beyond the boiling point of water, condensation can occur as is the case of steam turbines. The atmosphere is never homogenous in four dimensions, and that includes the various time zones. Afterall sunlight falls only on about half of the atmosphere, not the entire surface of the world on any particular given day, thus it is impossible not to condense elsewhere when you have evaporation always going.

Good point-- it can't just keep evaporating. I am worried though that major storms may be the primary source of rainfall, not the typical spring and summer showers we used to get.

After going 69 years without a major storm, Pensacola has had 5 major storms on the past 10 years.