Arivaca, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
These conditions suit cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Arivaca, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Arivaca lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Arivaca — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Arivaca — the short answer
Arivaca, Arizona: USDA zone 8b, about 247 days between hard freezes, across 18K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~247
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 18K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Arivaca's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Arivaca's 247-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Arivaca
Each reading below is measured for Arivaca itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredArivaca runs about 247 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredArivaca sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Arivaca is in
Arivaca sits in the Madrean Archipelago — EPA Level III, inside the wider Southern Semi-arid Highlands. That is read at Arivaca's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Pima County is mostly Sonoran Basin and Range. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Arivaca
Every plant below cleared Arivaca's own zone 8b and its 247-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Arivaca?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Arivaca
Survey cells within 31 miles of Arivaca checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 360 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Arivaca
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Arivaca. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- UNIVERSAL RANCH STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- ARIVACA MERCANTILEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Silver Flame MineMining · 2.3 mi
- CotaMining · 2.5 mi
- Golden GrainMining · 2.5 mi
- El Dorado, El Pueblo, and Helen GpsMining · 2.5 mi
- Wedge #2Mining · 2.5 mi
- Golden StarMining · 2.5 mi
- El Encanto GroupMining · 2.5 mi
- Fortuna #2Mining · 2.5 mi
- ConcepcionMining · 2.5 mi
- Green MonsterMining · 2.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Arivaca's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Arivaca.
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Arivaca
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Arivaca, Mining runs higher than the national average — 190 sites within ~10 miles of Arivaca. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Arivaca
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Arivaca average
Your land is one point inside Arivaca
Everything above resolves to Arivaca as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 18K acres. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at town scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Arivaca Average
Arivaca Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Arivaca
- ●One soil character for all of Arivaca
- ●Frost dates read at Arivaca's scale: Mar 13 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Arivaca's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Arivaca
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Arivaca, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Arivaca averages can't show:
We read public map data around Arivaca — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Arivaca average
How we know this about Arivaca
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Arivaca’s own record; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Arivaca
When does frost risk typically end in Arivaca?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Arivaca typically lands around Mar 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Apr 3.
When is the first frost in Arivaca?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Arivaca typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 247 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Arivaca?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Arivaca sees about 247 frost-free days — roughly Mar 13 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 3 to Nov 1, about 212 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Arivaca?
The federal record around Arivaca runs heavier than most — 195 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (190), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Arivaca?
From about Oct 16 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Arivaca's scale — its 8b band and its 247-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Arivaca's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Arivaca’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Arivaca's own scale — its own ~247-day season between 28°F freezes, the 17,777 acres it covers and 195 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Arivaca's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Arivaca's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 13 and Nov 15 and the ~247-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 195 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Arivaca, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Arivaca's boundary and the 17,777 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~247-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Arivaca sits in the Madrean Archipelago — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Arivaca checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Arivaca's 17,777 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Pima County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Pima County
- The growing challenges every Arizona grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Arizona
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Pima County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Arivaca's 17,777 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Arivaca you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 17,777 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Arivaca-wide figureread your own land →