Dripping Springs, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Growers here do well with artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Dripping Springs, 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 Dripping Springs 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 Dripping Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Dripping Springs — the short answer
Dripping Springs, Arizona: USDA zone 9a, about 295 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 12
- Gila County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 4
- Gila County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~295
- Gila County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 4K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Gila County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Dripping Springs's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Dripping Springs's 295-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Dripping Springs
Each reading below is measured for Dripping Springs itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsDripping Springs runs about 295 days between hard freezes (read from Gila County, the closest normal to Dripping Springs) — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredDripping Springs sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a.
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 Dripping Springs is in
Dripping Springs sits in the Sonoran Basin and Range — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Dripping Springs's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Gila County is mostly Arizona/New Mexico Mountains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Dripping Springs
Every plant below cleared Dripping Springs's own zone 9a and its 295-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Dripping Springs?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 12 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
Documented around Dripping Springs
Survey cells within 31 miles of Dripping Springs checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 372 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Dripping Springs
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Dripping Springs. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- D-04-16 08CBBNitrate · 0.8 mi
- D-04-15 01CBANitrate · 1.1 mi
- La TurcoMining · 1.9 mi
- Chilito QuarryMining · 1.9 mi
- Premier GroupMining · 1.9 mi
- CHRISTMAS MINE FACILITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- D-04-16 16BABNitrate · 2.2 mi
- D-04-15 02BBDNitrate · 2.2 mi
- Christmas ConcentratorMining · 2.3 mi
- Gold-Copper Mines Co.Mining · 2.8 mi
- San Bernardo Jr PropertyMining · 2.9 mi
- ChristmasMining · 3.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Dripping Springs'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 Dripping Springs.
Total Sites
130
within ~10 miles of Dripping Springs
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Dripping Springs
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Dripping Springs
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Dripping Springs, Mining runs higher than the national average — 88 sites within ~10 miles of Dripping Springs. 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 Dripping Springs
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 Dripping Springs average
Your land is one point inside Dripping Springs
Everything above resolves to Dripping Springs as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 4K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Gila County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 Dripping Springs Average
Dripping Springs Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Dripping Springs
- ●One soil character for all of Dripping Springs
- ●Frost dates read at Dripping Springs's scale: Feb 12 to Dec 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Dripping Springs's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Dripping Springs
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Dripping Springs, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Dripping Springs averages can't show:
We read public map data around Dripping Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Dripping Springs average
How we know this about Dripping Springs
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 Gila County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 Dripping Springs
When does frost risk typically end in Dripping Springs?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Dripping Springs typically lands around Feb 12, 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 Mar 5.
When is the first frost in Dripping Springs?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Dripping Springs typically arrives around Dec 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 20, so the watching starts about Nov 4 — about 295 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Dripping Springs?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Dripping Springs sees about 295 frost-free days — roughly Feb 12 through Dec 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 5 to Nov 20, about 260 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Dripping Springs?
The federal record around Dripping Springs runs heavier than most — 130 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (88), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.8 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 Dripping Springs?
From about Nov 4 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 Dec 4 (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 Dec 4. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Dripping Springs's scale — its 9a band and its 295-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Dripping Springs'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 Dripping Springs’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Dripping Springs's own scale — the 4,307 acres it covers and 130 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Dripping Springs's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 130 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Dripping Springs, the closest Nitrate record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Dripping Springs's boundary and the 4,307 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~295-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Dripping Springs sits in the Sonoran Basin and Range — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Dripping Springs checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Dripping Springs has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Gila County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Dripping Springs's 4,307 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 Dripping Springs's 4,307 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Dripping Springs you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 4,307 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.8 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 Dripping Springs-wide figureread your own land →
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