Find your USDA hardiness zone, then explore frost facts and 100 crops
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map divides North America into zones based on average annual minimum winter temperature. Your zone determines your frost-free growing season length, from 66 days in Zone 2A to 364 in Zone 11B. Each zone page below includes frost facts and a filterable list of 100 vegetables, herbs, and flowers, each linking to its plant page for planting windows.
Caring for a lawn alongside your garden? Try our lawn fertilizer calculator to find the right nitrogen rate and application window for your zone, grass type, and season.
IL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, OH, WI, ND, SD. Rich prairie soils with compressed growing seasons of 107 to 147 frost-free days. Late spring frosts and early fall freezes bracket the primary planting window.
NY, PA, NJ, CT, MA, ME, NH, VT, RI, DE, MD. Four distinct seasons with rocky and acidic soils. Growing seasons run 110 to 135
frost-free days across the zone 4b–6a band that covers most of the region.
See our Northeast Vegetable Gardening Guide → · The NE guide covers zones 3b–8a. Zone 3b appears under Great Plains above; zones 4a–6b under Midwest above; zones 7a–8a under Southeast below.
Southeast
GA, NC, SC, VA, AL, TN, MS, AR, KY, LA, WV. Long humid summers with mild winters allow dual spring/fall planting cycles. Growing seasons run 156 to 205 frost-free days.
Five sub-regions from the Panhandle to the Rio Grande Valley. Drought management and dual growing seasons (spring + fall) define the strategy. Growing seasons run 225 frost-free days in the primary zone.
See our Texas Vegetable Gardening Guide → · The TX guide covers zones 6b–10b. Zone 6b appears under Midwest above; zones 7a–8b under Southeast above; zone 9a in the Texas section; zones 9b–10b under Florida below.
Florida & Subtropics
FL, HI, coastal Southern CA. Subtropical to tropical conditions with inverted growing calendars: the prime vegetable season runs October through April. Growing seasons run 259 to 364 frost-free days.
Bay Area, Sacramento Valley, Wine Country, Sierra Foothills, North Coast. Mediterranean climate with dry summers and wet winters: a fundamentally different moisture pattern than same-zone regions elsewhere.
Some regions are defined more by geography and climate pattern than by USDA zone alone. These guides cover zones already listed above but with region-specific growing strategies.
Pacific Northwest
Oregon, Washington · Zones 5b–9b
Maritime climate with cool summers and 37–60 inches of annual rainfall. The PNW cool season is a second growing season, not a shutdown.