Cedar Creek, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Cedar Creek, 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 Cedar Creek 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 Cedar Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cedar Creek — the short answer
Cedar Creek, Arizona: USDA zone 7a, about 217 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~217
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 11K 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 7a is Cedar Creek's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cedar Creek's 217-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cedar Creek
Each reading below is measured for Cedar Creek itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCedar Creek runs about 217 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
MeasuredCedar Creek sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Cedar Creek is in
Cedar Creek sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Temperate Sierras. That is read at Cedar Creek's own centroid rather than borrowed from Gila County.
What Grows in Cedar Creek
Every plant below cleared Cedar Creek's own zone 7a and its 217-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cedar Creek?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 9; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 6 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Cedar Creek
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cedar Creek. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WMATUA Miner FlatPFAS · 7.6 mi
Measured from Cedar Creek'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 Cedar Creek.
Total Sites
1
within ~10 miles of Cedar Creek
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 PFAS sampling location
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cedar Creek
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •PFAS do not break down in groundwater. Irrigate from a tested source.
Check your specific parcel in Cedar Creek
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 Cedar Creek average
Your land is one point inside Cedar Creek
Everything above resolves to Cedar Creek as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 11K 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 Cedar Creek Average
Cedar Creek Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Cedar Creek
- ●One soil character for all of Cedar Creek
- ●Frost dates read at Cedar Creek's scale: Apr 6 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cedar Creek's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cedar Creek
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cedar Creek, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cedar Creek averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cedar Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cedar Creek average
How we know this about Cedar Creek
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 Cedar Creek’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 Cedar Creek
When does frost risk typically end in Cedar Creek?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cedar Creek typically lands around Apr 6, 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 27.
When is the first frost in Cedar Creek?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cedar Creek typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 217 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cedar Creek?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cedar Creek sees about 217 frost-free days — roughly Apr 6 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 27 to Oct 26, about 182 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cedar Creek?
The federal record around Cedar Creek shows 1 documented site, mostly PFAS entries (1), the nearest PFAS record about 7.6 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Cedar Creek?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cedar Creek's scale — its 7a band and its 217-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cedar Creek'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 Cedar Creek’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Cedar Creek's own scale — its own ~217-day season between 28°F freezes, the 10,902 acres it covers and 1 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cedar Creek's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cedar Creek's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 6 and Nov 9 and the ~217-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cedar Creek, the closest PFAS record about 7.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cedar Creek's boundary and the 10,902 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~217-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cedar Creek's own centroid, the Arizona/New Mexico MountainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cedar Creek's 10,902 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Gila County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Gila 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 Gila County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cedar Creek's 10,902 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cedar Creek you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 10,902 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest PFAS record about 7.6 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 Cedar Creek-wide figureread your own land →
More in Arizona
Wider growing context
What grows across ArizonaCedar Creek sits outside our named growing regions, so Arizona as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides