You're listening to life kit from NPR.
I'm Regina Barber in from Ariel Saguera.
Gardening can be magical.
Planting a little baby plant and watching it grow into something with blooms or even fruit you can eat, that's special.
And if you're giving these plants a lot of time and attention, you want to give them the best shot of survival.
That's why many home gardeners use something called the hardiness zone map.
It basically says which plants will survive where.
But there's a big change to that map.
Late last year, the USDA updated its hardiness zone map for the first time in over a decade.
So in gardening spaces, this is pretty big news.
If you're a nerd like me, you're like, whoa, what changed?
That's Daniel Wood.
He's a graphics reporter at NPR, and he wants to look into this change because he's also a gardener.
Avid.
Avid's always the word.
This episode of Life Kit, Daniel's going to walk us through the changes on the USDA's map, why it needs updating, and we'll even get into what new gardening possibilities may exist in your neck of the woods.
Okay, so tell me more about the USDA plant hardiness zone map.
Like, what is it?
Well, it's like a.
It's a beautiful map with all these different colors, but what it basically is.