One of the first things to figure out, when you start gardening in the San Francisco Bay Area, is your climate zone. The climate zone describes the general traits of the area including temperature, humidity, and physical and seasonal characteristics. You'll soon find that within these climate zones, Bay Area regions, cities, towns, neighborhoods, streets, and even yards have distinct microclimates.
The Sunset climate zones are useful for identifying plants that can live year round in the zone (versus the United States Department of Agriculture hardiness zones for identifying plants that can survive winter). The difference is thrive vs. survive.
Our plot of land is in the hill area surrounding Montclair, in Oakland. According to Sunset, this puts us in Zone 16, which is in the coast range thermal belt. We are influenced by the marine layer (which includes fog), and warm inland breezes. This helps inform our plant choices for the garden.
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| Coastal fog in Zone 16. Per Dallman, fog drip can add as much as 10 inches (25 cm) of precipitation to recorded yearly rainfall. |
Dallman, Peter R. “The Mediterranean Climate,” in Plant Life in the World’s Mediterranean Climates (page 3). University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, California, 1998. ISBN 978-0-520-20809-4.
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