Hardiness zone lies

[Ohiopalmloverz6]

As we all know, most potted Norfolk Island Pines people buy at the store are Cook Pines, and for what I’ve seen, most people say that these are zone 10 plants, however, in my grandmother’s neighborhood in central Florida in the Tampa area (slightly more inland from the ocean), it is littered with Cook Pines, they seem to grow well, they have seen 25F maybe even 24F, I don’t know why people think these guys are that frost tender when they can take zone 9.

[metalfan]

Agree.

[RedRabbit]

They do fine outside of what’s traditionally considered Z10. However, you need to be deeper into Z10 to see older ones. There are quite a few in south St. Pete, then into Manatee and Sarasota counties. 

[Silas_Sancona]

8 minutes ago, RedRabbit said:

They do fine outside of what’s traditionally considered Z10. However, you need to be deeper into Z10 to see older ones. There are quite a few in south St. Pete, then into Manatee and Sarasota counties. 

Maybe in FL??  .. but not in CA.. Not a common  sight, but,  Some reasonably- sized specimens in my 9B / flirting with 10A neighborhood back in San Jose, planted sometime in the late -90s..  Will have to find a few of the oldies that have been around longer. 

Know there are some big, old timers around 9B areas of S. Cal as well. Gotta remember where tho..

As far as the title?  this is why peeps need to do their homework, ...Deeep in-depth / critical thinker- level homework.    Not just blindly trust what rando dude / ette in the Big Box plant section thinks / some generic tag says.. Give both the side eye, quite often.. 

[Ohiopalmloverz6]

10 minutes ago, Silas_Sancona said:

Maybe in FL??  .. but not in CA.. Not a common  sight, but,  Some reasonably- sized specimens in my 9B / flirting with 10A neighborhood back in San Jose, planted sometime in the late -90s..  Will have to find a few of the oldies that have been around longer. 

Know there are some big, old timers around 9B areas of S. Cal as well. Gotta remember where tho..

As far as the title?  this is why peeps need to do their homework, ...Deeep in-depth / critical thinker- level homework.    Not just blindly trust what rando dude / ette in the Big Box plant section thinks / some generic tag says.. Give both the side eye, quite often.. 

Definitely would overwinter in zone 9b FL better, FL usually stays warmer than what the hardiness zone says, plus Florida is much more hot and humid, which will encourage tons of growth from them

[Rain52]

They seem to grow crazy fast. Quite a few at the beaches.. Jax beach. Solid 9b. Think they love our hot wet summers. 

[Rivera]

Here's one near Telegraph Hill in San Francisco.

Photo credited to Mike Sullivan, who wrote The Trees of San Francisco. 

https://www.sftrees.com/blog/2021/1/18/telegraph-hill-social-distancing-tree-tour-1-16-21

This is not meant to be a statement about this tree's hardiness, as this is zone 10, but that's still pretty adaptable for a New Caledonian species. Araucaria heterophylla is a more commonly seen species here.