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Make your own zone map!


ruskinPalms

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5 hours ago, Jimbean said:

Interesting.  You think the isotherm map would look like that averaging since 1990?  I'd like to see some data, along with evidence to fill the gaps.

Good maps take patience and detail to make.  I'd like to see it a good zone map of the Tampa area, I've always wondered how it compared to east central Florida.  

Yes, I think so.

36 minutes ago, kinzyjr said:

I don't know if this will help as a quick reference or not, but here is a map of the Tampa region with the locations and abbreviations for the airports in the area.  Not 100% sure how much data you might be able to get for each of them from WeatherUnderground, NOAA, etc., but it's a good start.

202005192100_TampaBayAirStations.png

Thanks @kinzyjr. If memory serves, the airports had averages something like this:

1. low 20s, not sure on the exact number but want to say 24f.

4. 35f

5. 39f

6. 33f

8. 33f

9. 35f

10. 28f

I don’t recall what 7 was but a lot of people have criticized that reporting station as inaccurate so I’m not sure the averages matter there.

Edited by RedRabbit
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Westchase | 9b 10a  ◆  Nokomis | 10a  ◆  St. Petersburg | 10a 10b 

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16 minutes ago, RedRabbit said:

Yes, I think so.

Thanks @kinzyjr. If memory serves, the airports had averages something like this:

4. 35f

5. 39f

6. 33f

8. 33f

10. 28f

I don’t recall what 7 was but a lot of people have criticized that reporting station as inaccurate so I’m not sure the averages matter there.

I was actually surprised when I pulled the numbers for #7.  The average ended up either 32F or 33F and some change depending on which years you use, but after working so much in the Westshore area, I did expect Macdill to be 35F or greater without 1989 included due to the additional water influence.  The averages for #3 should be relatively close to KLAL, so 27- 30?

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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10 hours ago, RedRabbit said:

Yes, I think so.

Thanks @kinzyjr. If memory serves, the airports had averages something like this:

1. low 20s, not sure on the exact number but want to say 24f.

4. 35f

5. 39f

6. 33f

8. 33f

9. 35f

10. 28f

I don’t recall what 7 was but a lot of people have criticized that reporting station as inaccurate so I’m not sure the averages matter there.

Since 1990?

I should do the same for Brevard

Edited by Jimbean

Brevard County, Fl

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4 minutes ago, Jimbean said:

Since 1990?  I should do the same for Brevard

I believe @RedRabbit 's numbers are from 1990-2019.  In the case of Lakeland, it's either 29F or 30F since then, depending on the data sources used.

One issue I've come across multiple times is the data source amending the numbers midstream.  A good example is our Jan. 2010 numbers on Weather Underground.  At one time, the lows were 26, 28, 26 for the three coldest nights here.  Now, they are 27, 27, 28.  I took a look at the weather records for Jan. 2008 and found they had a few changes, particularly for the freeze on January 3rd, since my last data dump. Weather.com during Jan. 2018 was another example.  At one point it was 25, then it was 24, then it was 28.  My personal weather station recorded 28.2. 

In the case of NOAA, a lot of data is freely available from a lot of stations, but sometimes the data is mixed/matched across different areas of town and often times there are "holes".  I guess it can take some time for NOAA to move weather records from preliminary to "official", though.  Overall, I don't envy the tasks of creating a zone map for coastal locations.

Hopefully this will be of value in your efforts.

20200520_Brevard_outlying_AirStations.png

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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12 hours ago, kinzyjr said:

I don't know if this will help as a quick reference or not, but here is a map of the Tampa region with the locations and abbreviations for the airports in the area.  Not 100% sure how much data you might be able to get for each of them from WeatherUnderground, NOAA, etc., but it's a good start.

202005192100_TampaBayAirStations.png

I used this website to pull daily low temperature observations for every day from 2000-Present for Albert Whitted (KSPG).  I sorted the data to find the lowest observation for each year and found the average winter minimum for the past two decades to be slightly above 38* (see chart below). This would put Albert Whitted solidly in USDA 10B, but it's also essentially on the water.  I went through this pretty quicly, so feel free to point out any possible mistakes.  

image.png.a29af8731474066d8ceead623710e93c.png

Edited by JJPalmer
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3 minutes ago, JJPalmer said:

I used this website to pull daily low temperature observations for every day from 2000-Present for Albert Whitted (KSPG).  I sorted the data to find the lowest observation for each year and found the average winter minimum for the past two decades to be slightly above 38* (see chart below). This would put Albert Whitted solidly in USDA 10B, but it's also essentially on the water.  I went through this pretty quicly, so feel free to point out any possible mistakes.  

image.png.a29af8731474066d8ceead623710e93c.png

Thank you for sharing this source!  I'm going to try this site with KLAL and see what comes up.

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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image.png.b7829f2d3dfa760c2fcc196d1599cbe5.png

Here is the data for Tampa International Airport.  Since 1989 (and since 2000), the average minimum annual temperature is 33.  Keep in mind that this station is at the southernmost tip of the airport, nearest to the bay.  However, they also have an open field for several miles to the north due to runway, so I am not sure how that affects the climate at the station. For some reason, I am struggling to get data for PIE.

 

 

Edited by JJPalmer
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Here is Bradenton's - essentially the same as TPA. 1995-2001 seemed like a chilly period down here as well. image.png.8dcbf3ea5ed0497b989018bb0902cdde.png

 

Edited by JJPalmer
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Just for kicks - here is the Venice station.  Oddly similar, all three have average minimum annual temperatures at 33 degrees - although Venice doesn't have a temperature below 26 where the other reporting stations do. 

 

Capture.JPG

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50 minutes ago, JJPalmer said:

Just for kicks - here is the Venice station.  Oddly similar, all three have average minimum annual temperatures at 33 degrees - although Venice doesn't have a temperature below 26 where the other reporting stations do. 

 

Capture.JPG

My rental property isn’t far from there so typically guesstimate my lows based on their data. 29f for 2018 is surprising because none of the zone 10 palms had damage in that area. I thought the low was more like 32f. :huh:
 

I believe Venice’s low for the 1980s was 25 so it fared pretty good between the 3 big freezes.
 

 

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Westchase | 9b 10a  ◆  Nokomis | 10a  ◆  St. Petersburg | 10a 10b 

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1 hour ago, JJPalmer said:

image.png.b7829f2d3dfa760c2fcc196d1599cbe5.png

Here is the data for Tampa International Airport.  Since 1989 (and since 2000), the average minimum annual temperature is 33.  Keep in mind that this station is at the southernmost tip of the airport, nearest to the bay.  However, they also have an open field for several miles to the north due to runway, so I am not sure how that affects the climate at the station. For some reason, I am struggling to get data for PIE.

 

 

TIA gets thrown off by all the concrete from the Veterans and the runway. Paul Delgado has talked about it several times on-air since some of the summer highs recorded there have been too high. It probably makes low temps in the winter a little too high too. I’m not sure how far back this problem goes, but it’s not entirely wrong since it’s just recording urban heating. 

1 hour ago, JJPalmer said:

Here is Bradenton's - essentially the same as TPA. 1995-2001 seemed like a chilly period down here as well. image.png.8dcbf3ea5ed0497b989018bb0902cdde.png

 

Brandenton’s airport is sort of in a cold spot for that area. It’s a little too far south to benefit from Tampa Bay and not quite far enough west to get the full benefits of the Gulf. I remember some of the zone 10 palms there had a minor amount of damage in 2018, whereas the ones in downtown Bradenton or further south in Sarasota were unscathed. 

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Westchase | 9b 10a  ◆  Nokomis | 10a  ◆  St. Petersburg | 10a 10b 

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On 5/15/2020 at 11:04 PM, JJPalmer said:

I seem to have been able to pull up the photobucket image conveniently after spending well over an hour trying to recreate it.  Maybe this is deserving of a new thread with comments / suggestions, but I figured I would update this thread first. 

image.thumb.png.065e1122c4272f517b96a2fa5f441fb1.png

 

Zone Map.jpg

Thanks for digging the picture off of photobucket!  I think this map I made in 2007 is pretty good still. Probably more accurate now than in 2007.  As far as defining parts of Florida as 10A or higher, just look for native Ficus trees growing. If there are native Ficus trees growing in your area then you can feel pretty safe experimenting with Zone 10 palms. Sure, there will be bad freezes to the mid to upper 20s in these areas about every ten years but you may as well enjoy the zone 10 palms anyway for as long as they last. Some zone 10 palms may actually survive a freeze to 25 or 26. These freezes just can’t be frequent and multiple freezes in the same year is rough too. Something these zone maps leave out is an areas propensity to have frost and frozen dew. When I lived in Ruskin, I had tons of frost and frozen dew which made it pretty hard to grow zone 10 palms for the few years I tried there (2005 through 2009) even though it is technically a low zone 10 there. I even lived on a retention pond at the time which seemed to do little more than create nice conditions for frost and frozen dew to form... I’m high and dry here in Parrish and I don’t get much frost or frozen dew so far since moving here in 2015. Lowest so far in that span has been 27 or 28 in Jan 2018. My coconut barely got touched in that freeze but i did lose a few small trunkless foxtails. My 3 larger foxtails only had a little damage but did take some time to resume normal growth. I would call where I live now a low 10A as evidenced by native Ficus trees growing and by all the large zone 10 palms fruiting in my neighborhood (Foxtails, V. arecina, Royals, Adonidia and D. lutescens fruit fine here and make viable seeds). I do tend to only plant fast zone 10 palms because I want to enjoy them between big freezes. That’s maybe one reason I have held off planting slow New Caledonia species here because of the inevitable heart break that would ensue after spending all that time, money and effort to get a decent sized palm only to have it nailed by a freeze. 

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Parrish, FL

Zone 9B

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3 hours ago, JJPalmer said:

image.png.b7829f2d3dfa760c2fcc196d1599cbe5.png

Here is the data for Tampa International Airport.  Since 1989 (and since 2000), the average minimum annual temperature is 33.  Keep in mind that this station is at the southernmost tip of the airport, nearest to the bay.  However, they also have an open field for several miles to the north due to runway, so I am not sure how that affects the climate at the station. For some reason, I am struggling to get data for PIE.

 

 

Where did you get that data from?  Weather Underground is not showing me the station for the Melbourne airport. 

Brevard County, Fl

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51 minutes ago, Jimbean said:

Where did you get that data from?  Weather Underground is not showing me the station for the Melbourne airport. 

@JJPalmer Shared this link earlier: https://climate.ncsu.edu/cronos/?station=KSPG&temporal=daily

If you replace KSPG with the 4 letter code for the desired airport you should be able to get data for that airport.  If you need more than four years (for our purposes, I'm sure we do), you'll need to request it: https://climate.ncsu.edu/requestdata

There are other options available and I am just now exploring them a little myself.  If JJ has advice on how to use the site more effectively, please share.

As far as issues getting the data for Melbourne Airport (KMLB) on Weather Underground, try this link and then manipulate the month and year to start where you would like: https://www.wunderground.com/history/monthly/us/fl/melbourne/KMLB/date/2008-1

It may say Orlando Melbourne Airport, but it is the correct 4 letter assignment it is in the correct location on the map.

There are some holes in the data that you may have to fill in or merge with other data unfortunately.  The old data I have when I dumped it for KLAL a few years ago has a lot less holes, but at the same time, the numbers for Jan 2008, 2010, and 2018 - the most important data from my point of view - is amended.  I may just create two separate database table and use some SQL to perform a merge on the numbers.

NOAA can be a good source if you hunt around a little.  I've found that noting down all the data sets they have for each zip code and then deciding which one(s) I want so I can make one request for multiple sets tends to lighten my load when compiling and analyzing the data: https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cdo-web/

I collected AccuWeather data from 1992 (earliest they had available).  They had our low in 2008 at 23F and 2018 they had 24F.  Not sure where they recorded those numbers, but that is awful low to have Teddy Bears, Bottle Palms and Adonidias around that are setting seed.  I'd have to say they either recorded this in a low elevation cold spot or their instruments need checked. 

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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2 hours ago, ruskinPalms said:

Thanks for digging the picture off of photobucket!  I think this map I made in 2007 is pretty good still. Probably more accurate now than in 2007.  As far as defining parts of Florida as 10A or higher, just look for native Ficus trees growing. If there are native Ficus trees growing in your area then you can feel pretty safe experimenting with Zone 10 palms. Sure, there will be bad freezes to the mid to upper 20s in these areas about every ten years but you may as well enjoy the zone 10 palms anyway for as long as they last. Some zone 10 palms may actually survive a freeze to 25 or 26. These freezes just can’t be frequent and multiple freezes in the same year is rough too. Something these zone maps leave out is an areas propensity to have frost and frozen dew. When I lived in Ruskin, I had tons of frost and frozen dew which made it pretty hard to grow zone 10 palms for the few years I tried there (2005 through 2009) even though it is technically a low zone 10 there. I even lived on a retention pond at the time which seemed to do little more than create nice conditions for frost and frozen dew to form... I’m high and dry here in Parrish and I don’t get much frost or frozen dew so far since moving here in 2015. Lowest so far in that span has been 27 or 28 in Jan 2018. My coconut barely got touched in that freeze but i did lose a few small trunkless foxtails. My 3 larger foxtails only had a little damage but did take some time to resume normal growth. I would call where I live now a low 10A as evidenced by native Ficus trees growing and by all the large zone 10 palms fruiting in my neighborhood (Foxtails, V. arecina, Royals, Adonidia and D. lutescens fruit fine here and make viable seeds). I do tend to only plant fast zone 10 palms because I want to enjoy them between big freezes. That’s maybe one reason I have held off planting slow New Caledonia species here because of the inevitable heart break that would ensue after spending all that time, money and effort to get a decent sized palm only to have it nailed by a freeze. 

I totally agree, Ficus aurea may be the best indicator of zone 10. :greenthumb:

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Westchase | 9b 10a  ◆  Nokomis | 10a  ◆  St. Petersburg | 10a 10b 

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2 hours ago, ruskinPalms said:

Thanks for digging the picture off of photobucket!  I think this map I made in 2007 is pretty good still. Probably more accurate now than in 2007.  As far as defining parts of Florida as 10A or higher, just look for native Ficus trees growing. If there are native Ficus trees growing in your area then you can feel pretty safe experimenting with Zone 10 palms. Sure, there will be bad freezes to the mid to upper 20s in these areas about every ten years but you may as well enjoy the zone 10 palms anyway for as long as they last. Some zone 10 palms may actually survive a freeze to 25 or 26. These freezes just can’t be frequent and multiple freezes in the same year is rough too. Something these zone maps leave out is an areas propensity to have frost and frozen dew. When I lived in Ruskin, I had tons of frost and frozen dew which made it pretty hard to grow zone 10 palms for the few years I tried there (2005 through 2009) even though it is technically a low zone 10 there. I even lived on a retention pond at the time which seemed to do little more than create nice conditions for frost and frozen dew to form... I’m high and dry here in Parrish and I don’t get much frost or frozen dew so far since moving here in 2015. Lowest so far in that span has been 27 or 28 in Jan 2018. My coconut barely got touched in that freeze but i did lose a few small trunkless foxtails. My 3 larger foxtails only had a little damage but did take some time to resume normal growth. I would call where I live now a low 10A as evidenced by native Ficus trees growing and by all the large zone 10 palms fruiting in my neighborhood (Foxtails, V. arecina, Royals, Adonidia and D. lutescens fruit fine here and make viable seeds). I do tend to only plant fast zone 10 palms because I want to enjoy them between big freezes. That’s maybe one reason I have held off planting slow New Caledonia species here because of the inevitable heart break that would ensue after spending all that time, money and effort to get a decent sized palm only to have it nailed by a freeze. 

Frost and frozen dew are big issues once you get north of Banana Rd. on US-98N toward Dade City or below FL-540A heading south toward Bartow over here.

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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9 hours ago, kinzyjr said:

@JJPalmer Shared this link earlier: https://climate.ncsu.edu/cronos/?station=KSPG&temporal=daily

If you replace KSPG with the 4 letter code for the desired airport you should be able to get data for that airport.  If you need more than four years (for our purposes, I'm sure we do), you'll need to request it: https://climate.ncsu.edu/requestdata

There are other options available and I am just now exploring them a little myself.  If JJ has advice on how to use the site more effectively, please share.

As far as issues getting the data for Melbourne Airport (KMLB) on Weather Underground, try this link and then manipulate the month and year to start where you would like: https://www.wunderground.com/history/monthly/us/fl/melbourne/KMLB/date/2008-1

It may say Orlando Melbourne Airport, but it is the correct 4 letter assignment it is in the correct location on the map.

There are some holes in the data that you may have to fill in or merge with other data unfortunately.  The old data I have when I dumped it for KLAL a few years ago has a lot less holes, but at the same time, the numbers for Jan 2008, 2010, and 2018 - the most important data from my point of view - is amended.  I may just create two separate database table and use some SQL to perform a merge on the numbers.

NOAA can be a good source if you hunt around a little.  I've found that noting down all the data sets they have for each zip code and then deciding which one(s) I want so I can make one request for multiple sets tends to lighten my load when compiling and analyzing the data: https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cdo-web/

I collected AccuWeather data from 1992 (earliest they had available).  They had our low in 2008 at 23F and 2018 they had 24F.  Not sure where they recorded those numbers, but that is awful low to have Teddy Bears, Bottle Palms and Adonidias around that are setting seed.  I'd have to say they either recorded this in a low elevation cold spot or their instruments need checked. 

When I shared that link, I was able to search for 30 years of data without requesting. Not sure how I did that @Jimbean @kinzyjr . But I used these for TPA, Bradenton, and Venice’s numbers: https://w2.weather.gov/climate/xmacis.php?wfo=mlb . 
 

You can use the map to click which stations you want to pull data from and filter by “monthly summarized data —> min temp” for a date range and it’ll automatically create the tables. Some stations aren’t shown in it for some reason, but for the ASOS stations that are it’s great!

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image.thumb.png.f5c7ac623e018aa4eb5a72da8f41a7a8.png

I went through the NWS NOWdata database and found the average annual minimum for every station in central and south florida from 1989-Present.  A few of these stations are missing a few data points, and I excluded a few stations (north okochobee) which lacked data for 1989 and 2009-Present.  Lot of intersting data. Seems like the East Coast of Florida gets signficantly more tropical around Jupiter and South.  St. Petersburg is the warmest station on the west coast of Florida - likely due to the proximity close to the water.  Archbold in the center of the state is quite an outlier at 24.  I can DM the file over if anyone would like.  Just used excel and red text boxes to overlay the map - in hindsight, I should have used a blank map to make it easier to read. @kinzyjr @ruskinPalms @Jimbean @RedRabbit

Edited by JJPalmer
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@JJPalmer Red rover, red rover DM the data right over.... or just attach it to a post... I'm interested in matching it against each of the sources I've compiled.  Some of the data dumps I have contain some questionable readings to say the least.

Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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On 5/20/2020 at 6:22 AM, kinzyjr said:

I believe @RedRabbit 's numbers are from 1990-2019.  In the case of Lakeland, it's either 29F or 30F since then, depending on the data sources used.

One issue I've come across multiple times is the data source amending the numbers midstream.  A good example is our Jan. 2010 numbers on Weather Underground.  At one time, the lows were 26, 28, 26 for the three coldest nights here.  Now, they are 27, 27, 28.  I took a look at the weather records for Jan. 2008 and found they had a few changes, particularly for the freeze on January 3rd, since my last data dump. Weather.com during Jan. 2018 was another example.  At one point it was 25, then it was 24, then it was 28.  My personal weather station recorded 28.2. 

In the case of NOAA, a lot of data is freely available from a lot of stations, but sometimes the data is mixed/matched across different areas of town and often times there are "holes".  I guess it can take some time for NOAA to move weather records from preliminary to "official", though.  Overall, I don't envy the tasks of creating a zone map for coastal locations.

Hopefully this will be of value in your efforts.

20200520_Brevard_outlying_AirStations.png

All I see is incomplete data.  I know that there is complete data out there.  This is where I have to look.

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Brevard County, Fl

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This is based on incomplete data; take this with a grain of salt.  It's the best I could do after digging around and using a few different sites.  The exact locations vary somewhat, and date does not start getting nearly 100% complete until 2002 in many cases.  

For Melbourne I got 33.93 (omitting two readings that where too high to be likely, in the red)

Melbourne:

90           41?

91           31

92           34

93           33

94           40?

95           30

96           28?

97           30

98           40?

99           32

00           30

01           30          

02           31

03           30

04           38

05           34

06           31

07           34

08           34

09           29

10           28?

11           34

12           33

13           35

14           30

15           34

16           35

17           39

18           30

19           37

20           36 (so far)

 

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Brevard County, Fl

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Data was slightly better, but I had to omit more years (in the red) because the data was incomplete and the minimums seemed to be outliers.  

 

Patrick AFB

90           47?

91           33

92           42?

93           44?

94           41?

95           33

96           35

97           37

98           43

99           39

00           30

01           46

02           36

03           34

04           45?

05           46?

06           39

07           42

08           37

09           34

10           30

11           37

12           40

13           42

14           39

15           38

16           37

17           43

18           32

19           42

20           39 (so far)

 

Average: 39.04

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Brevard County, Fl

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I would also like to add that it was reported from these stations that in December of 1989 that Melbourne airport officially recorded a low of 21F and Patrick AFB a low of 24F.  For Patrick AFB it is recorded as the all time record low, but  data only goes back to 1950, and is shoddy between 1986 and 2002.  Why between 1986 and 2002?  I have no clue.

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Brevard County, Fl

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If the data is to be believed, then the next step I would take is to calculate the average difference between stations, and project their estimated lows for 30 years.  For example, use the official station that has already been calculated by jjpalmer and average the difference between cold events (where temperatures go below 40F), as far back as possible on each station.  I would use each station that has winter data on weather underground for the estimated data points.

 

 

Tampa Bay area.png

Edited by Jimbean

Brevard County, Fl

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14 hours ago, JJPalmer said:

image.thumb.png.f5c7ac623e018aa4eb5a72da8f41a7a8.png

I went through the NWS NOWdata database and found the average annual minimum for every station in central and south florida from 1989-Present.  A few of these stations are missing a few data points, and I excluded a few stations (north okochobee) which lacked data for 1989 and 2009-Present.  Lot of intersting data. Seems like the East Coast of Florida gets signficantly more tropical around Jupiter and South.  St. Petersburg is the warmest station on the west coast of Florida - likely due to the proximity close to the water.  Archbold in the center of the state is quite an outlier at 24.  I can DM the file over if anyone would like.  Just used excel and red text boxes to overlay the map - in hindsight, I should have used a blank map to make it easier to read. @kinzyjr @ruskinPalms @Jimbean @RedRabbit

2012 map for reference 

https://www.plantmaps.com/interactive-florida-2012-usda-plant-zone-hardiness-map.php

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Brevard County, Fl

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My estimate, if you are to use current 30 year averages, red line 30-35 and brown line 35-40

current averages.gif

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Brevard County, Fl

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Based on long term survivability.  Takes more into account record lows, and uses 33 to 38 for 10A (red line), 28 to 33 9B (yellow line).  This map is my definition of zones in Brevard.

 

current.gif

Edited by Jimbean

Brevard County, Fl

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Estimated average lows for Patrick AFB, and Melbourne International.  Estimated record lows in brackets.

lows.gif

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Brevard County, Fl

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What survived post-1989.  Particularity, and estimate of where coconut palms survived 2010 freezes (brown), and an estimate of where Ficus aurea can be seen growing to tree size and royals have survived since 1989 and has steadily become more common.  

If the current warm trend continues, then this also serves a possible estimate of where a 10A line and a 10B line will roughly exist. 

estimated lines.gif

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Brevard County, Fl

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 5/22/2020 at 9:09 PM, JJPalmer said:

I went through the NWS NOWdata database and found the average annual minimum for every station in central and south florida from 1989-Present.  A few of these stations are missing a few data points, and I excluded a few stations (north okochobee) which lacked data for 1989 and 2009-Present.  Lot of intersting data. Seems like the East Coast of Florida gets signficantly more tropical around Jupiter and South.  St. Petersburg is the warmest station on the west coast of Florida - likely due to the proximity close to the water.  Archbold in the center of the state is quite an outlier at 24.  I can DM the file over if anyone would like.  Just used excel and red text boxes to overlay the map - in hindsight, I should have used a blank map to make it easier to read. @kinzyjr @ruskinPalms @Jimbean @RedRabbit

Thanks for that link, @JJPalmer.  It was a lot of help doing a deep dive comparison without having to do a lot of programming and scripting.

There are a few things that make an accurate zone map for my area an adventurous project. 

One of the issues is the variance in readings throughout the region during each of the major freeze events.  I've posted several photos and spreadsheets of data dumped from a copy of Weather Underground KLAL data I made back in mid-2018 in various threads on the site.  Unfortunately, these readings are not necessarily representative of the region as a whole.  In the example for January 2010 below, you'll see a variance of an entire zone in less than 8 miles.

In January 2010, the ultimate low could have been either 16.7F (JayW), 17F (CFPACS member), 23F (AccuWeather/NOAA), 26F (Me at my old place) or 27F (WeatherUnderground).  I personally recorded 26F near the Lakeland Square Mall.  The old WeatherUnderground records I dumped in 2018 shared this same number.  The 16.7F and 17F numbers were from palm growers more out in the country toward Auburndale and Polk City.  23F came from NOAA and AccuWeather at KLAL.  If you look at Weather Underground today it should say 27F (twice) for a low in Jan. 2010 (see graphic).

202006101200_Wundeground_KLAL_Jan2010.png

Another recent example is the advective freeze in January of 2018.  The low was either 24F (AccuWeather/NOAA/old WeatherUnderground dump), 25F (WeatherUnderground), 26F (one of the stations in the graphic), 28F (my MIN on my station) or 29F (Turtle Rock station?) according to weather records or personal weather stations.  @RedRabbit kept screenshots of the temperature in the AM on this thread: https://www.palmtalk.org/forum/index.php?/topic/55620-florida-freeze-january-18-2018-advective/

After looking at the weather records on WeatherUnderground, AccuWeather and NOAA - I had to go back and check other records against my own weather station.  From that thread, these were the temperatures at ~7:10AM.  The station near Lake Hollingsworth had 28F and the one near the Polk Parkway had 29F.  At least my MIN reading of 28.2F on my weather station is not out of the question since I'm close to these two stations.  The other stations may have recorded something lower earlier that morning before the screenshot was taken.

LakelandArea_RedRabbit_Capture5.png

Another challenge is getting weather close to where you are at rather than at the airport.  Our airport is like most; out in the middle of nowhere in freeze country.  Using Jim's second method of using the plant life that is long term there to determine the growing zone, there is no way all of the palms I posted on Reds Remarkable Palms of Tampa Bay thread were exposed to 23F or less in 2010 and lived to tell the tale, much less having two dozen newly planted Foxtails, a new Coconut palm and a Bottle palm all swallow a low of 25F with 15-20mph wind in 2018.  Weather Underground presents the best opportunity to discover areas that are milder due to elevation, water, UHI, etc. but it is tough to preserve all of that history unless you do what Red did for every single freeze every winter.  We don't have another reporting station that keeps temperature history closer to downtown area unfortunately.

As @Jimbean noted, there are a lot of holes in some of the data.   I took the new WeatherUnderground numbers, patched some of the holes in the new data with the numbers present in the old dump, and then patched the remaining holes with AccuWeather data.  Unfortunately, this only yields a solid data set from March 1993 to present.  Since 1993 isn't complete and 2020 isn't over yet, that leaves 1994-2019 (26 years).  Those calculations yield an average annual low of ~29.73F; zone 9b.

202006100000_MergedData_1993-2020.png

Fortunately, no matter how much you mix and match numbers, they tend to come up pretty much the same.  I did a compare on the merged database table numbers with 1989-Mar1993 added into the mix, my own disputed numbers, and the NOAA numbers.  The averages are within .6 of a degree F of each other.

202006100000_MergedData_1989-2020.png

If you look at the NOW site, it reports the mean as 29.05 for all of the years from 1948-2020.  If someone wanted to argue that we need use exactly the last 30 complete years of data, one could make an argument that the city crosses the threshold for zone 10a, based on the data from WeatherUnderground past and present, with or without my disputed readings, or a very high-end 9b with NOAA data - with a 30 year minimum of 25F.  Probably still not a good idea to plant nothing but coconuts and Bottle Palms in your yard.  Sorry about the graphic... the bottom should say 1990-2019.

202006100000_30_KLAL_Data_1990-2019_10a.png

Fun fact for the day: Winter Haven is a solid zone 10a according to the NOAA data from 1989-2020 (32F) :)  Anyone want to start a coconut farm?

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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  • 2 months later...

Your addition of 10a in Lakeland and Winter Haven must be true. Think of the giant banyan tree at Cypress Gardens! FYI I believe you meant 37.5 as the starting point for upper level 10b on the key. It says 35.5.

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  • 2 months later...

 

IR satellite image from tonight showing the warmth of the Everglades (darker grey) and the heat of the Gulf Stream off the east coast. Shows why SE FL is far less freeze prone than SW FL. 

CD8AF5E6-4366-4DB7-836F-E0DA9E3AC369.jpeg

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Moist to saturated soil releases heat more slowly than dry soils.  The differences between sandy soils, denser soils, and soils containing organic matter magnifies this difference.

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With one month to go in 2020, the new 30-year ‘climate normal period’ is looking much warmer globally than the previous.   Map is courtesy of Brian Brettschneider on Twitter. 

63853F6E-C3AB-402D-831E-966B2B77ECD7.jpeg

Edited by JJPalmer
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imo this would be really hard with the dc area because it is so variable the northern suburbs in maryland can be from 6b-7b with microclimates and the southern suburbs where I live in virginia is from 7a by Chantilly and where I live which is a solid 7b is near the potomac. our winters are very variable most winters 8a and some winters 9a.

"The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it."
~ Neil deGrasse Tyson

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  • 8 months later...

Made this one using composite stations and a more refined zoning scheme:

202008261535_All_Of_Florida_3600_NewZones_Final.png

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Lakeland, FL

USDA Zone 1990: 9a  2012: 9b  2023: 10a | Sunset Zone: 26 | Record Low: 20F/-6.67C (Jan. 1985, Dec.1962) | Record Low USDA Zone: 9a

30-Year Avg. Low: 30F | 30-year Min: 24F

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4 hours ago, kinzyjr said:

Made this one using composite stations and a more refined zoning scheme:

202008261535_All_Of_Florida_3600_NewZones_Final.png

Very accurate from what I can tell in South Florida. It gives a good general idea. Thanks for all the hard work!

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15 hours ago, kinzyjr said:

Made this one using composite stations and a more refined zoning scheme:

 

Nice map!  Alot of thought and detail.

 

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