Hi! I’m David Epstein and this is Growing Wisdom. Today, I’d like to talk to you about microclimates and there are areas inside of one zone or one climate that have a little bit of a different climate. So I have more of a colder climate in the front part of my house, but then you end up in a place like this, three houses from where we just were where there is no snow, and it looks like the middle of spring. So this is a little bit of a warmer microclimate.

There are certain conditions or factors that can create a microclimate, for example, the direction the sun hits your garden. A north-facing garden would be a colder microclimate like my front yard, or a south-facing garden would be a warmer microclimate like that lawn we showed you. This microclimate is created as a result of the house and the bulkhead. The bulkhead and the house, and the foundation give off a little bit of extra heat so my zone 7 plant, this hydrangea actually ends up living in a zone 6 area. My homalomena hasn’t started to bloom yet, I’m going to show you something really unique just up the road, same zone but a different microclimate.

Alright so we’ve driven just a few houses away. This is a homalomena, as you remember, mine wasn’t blooming and this one is, most likely because of the proximity to the foundation. So, the foundation from this house is adding enough heat to get this guy blooming here. So as you’re planting, as you create gardens, think about your microclimates. Do you have a little bit of a warmer microclimate or colder microclimate, and based on that, choose your plant wisely. So, if you have a plant that’s marginal, try to get into a warmer microclimate, hardier plants, they’ll do better in a colder microclimate. Microclimates are really important, something that we need to think about as we create our gardens here at Growing Wisdom.