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I want to obtain the entire dataset for all zip codes in the US along with their corresponding USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map (PHZM) data.
There are many sites that seem to offer a zipcode lookup tool and this data is returned. Where do they get the entire database?
In my Search I found this site where I can purchase credits and do queries for multiple zip codes and get a .txt for .csv file. There has to be a better way.
There's an Open Plant Hardiness Zones (OPHZ) project on Github where various people have reverse-engineered a pdf of the hardiness zones (pdf, really large) to produce a GIS file (SHP) of the zone boundaries. The ophz-c version is the latest. It's public domain.
You could use GIS software or tools, and a list of the center point of each zip, to find the hardiness zone for each zip. (you're no doubt aware there are no firm boundaries for each ZIP, so this would just be an approximate answer, the latitude and longitude of a street address would be better).
Doesn't even have to be GIS software. You could convert the SHP file to geojson if needed, import it into a geo-aware database such as MongoDB or Postgres, import the zip code list as well, and use the database GIS queries to give you "zip is within .. zone" answers.
Probably a more complex solution than you'd like. Maybe somebody has done these steps already and released the results, but I'm not aware of it.
Just released on Github!!
A parser and resulting dataset for USDA plant hardiness zones. It uses the ZIP-querying API built into the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Plant Hardiness Zone website (e.g., http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/ZipProxy.ashx?ZipCode=55555
Full data set:
CSV (1 MB) (archive.org link)
MySQL (1.8 MB) (archive.org link)
Static Github API: (Replace 20001 with your zipcode)
https://phzmapi.org/20001.json
The GIS data is contracted out to the PRISM group at Oregon State University. One can purchase the high resolution maps they created, operating under the entity Climate Source.
I have not found a direct download from the USDA on the zipcode dataset. Instead, you can semi-auto query using this backdoor call.
http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/ZipProxy.ashx?d=00:00:00&ZipCode=97228
The problem is that after every 5 calls, it will return a result requiring you to enter a Captcha. There are about 50K zip codes in the US. That's about 10,000 times one would have to enter a captcha.
