[timr]

By "buried", I mean: "hidden in a collapsed 'about this data' accordion, below the 'change in lowest winter temperature' color bar, in the fourth text box that appears on downward scrolling."

Unless you're seeing a wildly different website than I am, this is a strange definition of "up front and clear".

But just to belabor the point a bit, if I were a journalist covering this, my lede -- the very first paragraph of the story -- would be something like this:

"Recently, the USDA updated its plant hardiness map for the first time in 11 years. Among other changes, it based the definition of winter temperatures on data from 1991-2020, dropping data from 1976-1991 as part of the update. This resulted in a calculated increase in lowest winter temperatures in many locations across the United States."

Simple. Factual. Unbiased. Provides necessary context. It isn't that hard to be a good journalist here. I hesitate to speculate, but my suspicion is that this was buried because it weakens a narrative that the writers and editors were trying to achieve, by adding nuance.