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What's Your Zone?

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  The SGI Plant Heat Zones Map No, that's not the latest pick-up line.  Do You Know What Your Heat Zone Is?   If you've been gardening for any length of time, you probably know what hardiness zone you live in. But do you know what your heat zone is?  While hardiness zones track the cold, heat zones track the summer highs. Hardiness Zone = average annual extreme minimum winter temperature at your location, measured over a 30-year period. Heat Zone = average number of days above 86°F at your location, measured over a 30-year period. Both zones are important for maintaining healthy outdoor plants and  climate-resilient landscaping. Why Heat Zones Matter For Sustainable Gardening Hardiness zones are only half of a plant’s survival story. If you’ve ever wondered why a plant that’s supposed to grow well in your hardiness zone struggles to survive or even dies during the summer, it's likely due to summer heat stress -- trying to grow it in the wro...
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34 Great Resources for Learning About Bees, Butterflies, and Other Pollinators

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Looking for sustainable gardening information on inviting bees, beetles, butterflies, and other beneficial insects into your garden? How to identify which ones are visiting your backyard? Learning about the lifestyles of the honey-makers and nectar-sippers?  Explore the Sustainable Gardening Library’s Topics app to learn from the experts at public gardens and arboreta, colleges and universities, and government agencies. They’re sharing their knowledge all in one place, so you don’t have to spend hours searching all over the web. Thirty-four organizations from Maine to Miami and Seattle to Suffolk, are sharing their photos, posters, research, and tip sheets with us to help you identify and support beneficial insects in your geographic region and plant hardiness zone. Just go to the Library’s Topics Directory , and select the Beneficial Insects icon to open up an interactive map that shows the locations of our content providers. Click on any map pin to open a popup that provides ...
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