Typically, this time of year, gardeners are looking out for frost and freezing temperatures — even in metro Phoenix. But this year is different. This is shaping up to be one of the hottest winters ever in Phoenix.
December was the warmest ever recorded — and 2026 is off to an unseasonably warm start. And that means, if you’re a gardener like me, things aren’t looking quite the same this year.
But how are they different and how should we be adapting?
Melissa Kruse-Peeples is a local garden educator behind the Desert Smells Like Veggies and the Phoenix Seed Swap. She joined The Show to share more about what she's been thinking as she's watched the temperatures stay high through even what are supposed to be our coldest months.
Full conversation
MELISSA KRUSE-PEEPLES: Well, first of all, I'm thinking I'm glad I live here and not much the rest of the country.
LAUREN GILGER: Fair enough.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Which had it more extreme in the other direction. But then also sort of like, oh, yikes, is this our new normal? Like, are we just never going to have winter. Because while it's nice and gorgeous and beautiful out, it is also sort of concerning that if we never get any kind of winter and never get any freeze, that has impacts, too.
Particularly this year has been so buggy, like so many bugs, particularly these caterpillars that feast on broccoli and cabbage. And I've never had it this bad. And if we had a freeze, those moths that lay the eggs for the caterpillars would have sort of died off, but they're just kind of exploding.
GILGER: So interesting. So already some odd results of this odd weather. I mean so as you said, the concern is this is the new normal. Tell us, you know, what does actual normal look like for you in gardening in Phoenix in the winter? Like what are you normally growing? What are you normally watching for right now? Like, are you usually at this time of year normal watching to protect the garden from a freeze?
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Yeah. So here we, you know, rarely get too much below 30 degrees, but we can get, you know, below 35. And so I love to grow tomatoes and peppers and they do grow all year here. They would get frost damage. And so I'm always looking at the nighttime temperatures and would throw a sheet or a blanket over those areas that would. I haven't had to do that at all this year. And my goal really is to get the tomatoes and peppers to produce in March and April before it gets 110 degrees.
GILGER: Right.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: So it just not really being cold or freezing at all. All of those things have been producing November, December, January is just inundated. And it's been a great year for those warm season stuff.
GILGER: What are you harvesting right now? Because normally at this time of year you'd be, you know, harvesting lots of interesting and beautiful winter vegetables. But it sounds like it's kind of a mixture.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Well, yeah, and so I loved doing, and it's great to do the broccoli, kale, lettuce, cabbage. And what's interesting about those things, they thrive on the cooler temperatures. And honestly, the kale is a little bitter and it's a little, like, tough because it actually tastes sweeter. And those broccoli florets taste best when they get a light frost and get cold temperatures.
They've been coming on earlier, producing usually through the middle of February, but they've been coming in a couple weeks early. And so I'm pretty much done with a lot of the, what we call brassicas. And those warm season things are really thriving. So what we normally experience kind of in early March is happening now, early February instead.
GILGER: Right. Like, so we've had you on the show to talk about the fact that we already kind of have weird growing seasons in the Sonoran Desert as opposed to, you know, anyone gardening anywhere in the rest of the country. But it sounds like they're changing again.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Yeah. And typically we often get kind of a warm, like, we think spring is here in late January, and it's sort of what I call fall spring. Don't get too excited because then sometimes it's also snowed, like in north Scottsdale, like in the middle or late February.
GILGER: Right.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: So it can get quite cold, like in February. I would say February is typically like the coldest month, although this year does not seem to be that. And so our spring is usually like mid-February around Valentine's to the 25th or so is when it's go time for spring weather and there's no more threat of frost.
But this year does seem to be an anomaly in that there may not be a frost at all, right. But I don't know, every year we seem to be told, oh, the warmest January ever. The warmest January ever. So, yeah, I think we just have to really hedge our bets.
GILGER: So you mentioned the bugs and the fact that, you know, your broccoli doesn't quite taste as good without that frost, without one or two freezes.
What else is changing? Like, is there anything you can't grow right now that you usually can?
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Yeah, well, I would be concerned, like, I don't have peach trees. But for example, a lot of deciduous trees like peaches and plums and apples do actually do quite well in the desert. But they require a certain number of chill hours, and that's the number of time that that tree is below 45 degrees, and that triggers the tree to flower and produce the fruit.
And, well, typically in Phoenix, we get like, you know, you want a variety that's around 250 chill hours, which isn't a lot because there's a lot of varieties that are like 500, 600 chill hours. So those trees are confused. They don't know what to do, and they're not going to produce particularly well.
And so as we think about the future, we need to really be looking at varieties that are more adapted to lower chill hours to actually trigger them to flower and produce.
GILGER: Interesting. So this could change the kinds of fruit trees we can even have here in the future.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Right, right. But hopefully the breeders and people developing varieties are looking at lower and lower chill hours.
GILGER: So what should we be planting right now?
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Yeah, it definitely is warmer, but our days are still pretty short. Every day is getting longer and longer. And so it's not like you're behind or missed the boat on spring. We have a whole month of February. It's kind of the time to really prepare.
And so spring, for the warm stuff is doing things that produce a lot of flowers and fruits. So like squash, zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, eggplants. Those are the big things for springtime.
And of course, there's tons of flowers, sunflowers and zinnias and marigolds.
GILGER: I never lost my flowers this year. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So at least that's an upside.
KRUSE-PEEPLES: And that's what I mean by hedging our bets, because sometimes we don't quite know how hot or how mild it'll really be. And so kind of doing what would be considered cool season and warm season, because we could get either.
GILGER: Yeah. OK. So changing our patterns and our gardening as a result. Let me ask you lastly, Melissa, just about, you know what this means for your planning going forward. Like, it doesn't really bode well for summer, although I realize that might not have anything to do with what happens this summer in terms of heat.
But do you plan on trying to get in a lot more planting before things get too hot? Because it's gotten so hot and so much harder to grow things here in the summer?
KRUSE-PEEPLES: Yeah, it's interesting because sometimes when we have a really early or warm start to spring, the spring is relatively mild. Come, like, April and May.
It's also building a microclimate in the garden. And so those trees we have provide shade when it's hot, but they also provide some cover and prevent frost damage in the winter.
And kind of knowing your microclimate in your growing space and which areas, like the south side of my house is going to be much warmer for the wintertime, right. But then too hot in the summer. And so by shifting a lot of my planting to the south side now and then in the summer, I don't even bother too much with that.
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