United States Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zone changes for Kansas City

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The United States Department of Agriculture has changed it’s familiar map of plant hardiness zones.

They have changed the Kansas City area from zone 5 to zone 6, reflecting, they say, warmer average winters, despite the severity of the last two. That means more kinds of plants will be recommended for overwintering. No posters of the new map will be printed but an interactive version is available here: http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/

At Family Tree Nursery in Overland Park, they said they have noticed the change over the past several years.

“We’ve always carried some of the zone 6 hardy plants here. There’s people that have special spots and little microclimates in their yard that will accommodate them,” said Eric Nelson, family Tree owner.

“But those plants are working in a broader way now and we have a lot of people asking for them so we’re starting to carry some of those,” he added.

Dennis Patton is a Johnson County Extension Horticultural Agent.

“As a horticulturist, one of my jobs is to recommend plants to people … I had told people ‘if you want to try these zone 6 plants make sure you’ve got the microclimate’ … but now we can probably recommend those plants with more reliability,” he said.