An Overview of Garden Zones

An Overview of Garden Zones

Gardening is an adventure. Most people start by planting a few flowers and maybe a few of their favorite vegetables. They put some seeds in the ground

and they are amazed that something actually sprouted and grew. That gives you courage to try some other plants. Gardening is a learning process that never really ends.

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Garden Zones

You want to know which garden zone you live in because some plants will do well in your zone and others will struggle. This will apply to most plants including flowers, shrubs, trees, vegetables.

The zones are defined by the first and lasts frosts of the year and how hot it is where they live during the growing season. Thus, southern California where you can grow plants all year long will be in a different zone than Illinois where the growing frosts can occur as early as September. Frosts are the death of plants.

Other factors for determining a garden zone include the amount of rainfall (not hose watering), the type of the soil found there and the amount of sunlight in the zone.

Don't take a garden zone as gospel, though. It is simply a guideline. Some plants that are said not to be the best to grow in your garden will sometimes do very well there. Zones can extend over large parts of the country where there are many differences inside the zone.

Soil is a major factor in how your plants will progress. So, if you have great soil in your garden, you can expect some success in any zone if your plants have enough water. Here is a rule of thumb: if the plant or seed is sold at the local garden story in your area or by respected mail order suppliers, then you can be very sure that plant will do well in your garden. The garden business would soon go out of business if they sold plants that die before maturing.

I wish I had worked with seedling plants in my first few years of gardening instead of using seeds. Your learning process begins with getting the plant to pop itself into the sunlight and often that itself is a monumental task for the first-time gardener. In time I learned where my plants would usually succeed.

You can find some nice zone maps here:
http://www.thegardenhelper.com/hardiness.htm

Probably the best way to learn about your garden zone is to corral the experts at your local and trusted garden center and ask them plenty of questions. You can learn much faster from good teachers than by reading.

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