Forest Lakes, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
On paper, cabbage, pawpaw, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Forest Lakes, 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 Forest Lakes 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 Forest Lakes — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Forest Lakes — the short answer
Forest Lakes, Arizona: USDA zone 7a, about 177 days between hard freezes, across 7K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~177
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 7K 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 Forest Lakes's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Forest Lakes's 177-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Forest Lakes
Each reading below is measured for Forest Lakes itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredForest Lakes runs about 177 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredForest Lakes 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 Forest Lakes is in
Forest Lakes sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Temperate Sierras. That is read at Forest Lakes's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Coconino County is mostly Arizona/New Mexico Plateau. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Forest Lakes
Every plant below cleared Forest Lakes's own zone 7a and its 177-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Forest Lakes?
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 Apr 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Forest Lakes
Survey cells within 31 miles of Forest Lakes checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 375 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Forest Lakes
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Forest Lakes. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FAMILY DOLLAR #6721Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- FOREST LAKES MERCANTILEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- A-11-15 07CBBNitrate · 1.9 mi
- RIM RESORT EXXONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- AG&F - CANYON CREEK FISH HATCHERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- JESSE CRAIG INC AG RCVRY UNITBrownfields · 7.0 mi
- A-11-13 36CACNitrate · 7.7 mi
- A-11-13 36CCDNitrate · 7.9 mi
- A-11-13 34CBANitrate · 9.6 mi
- ADOT - COLCORD MAINTENANCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.7 mi
Measured from Forest Lakes'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 Forest Lakes.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Forest Lakes
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Forest Lakes
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
Check your specific parcel in Forest Lakes
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 Forest Lakes average
Your land is one point inside Forest Lakes
Everything above resolves to Forest Lakes as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 7K 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 Forest Lakes Average
Forest Lakes Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Forest Lakes
- ●One soil character for all of Forest Lakes
- ●Frost dates read at Forest Lakes's scale: May 2 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Forest Lakes's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Forest Lakes
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Forest Lakes, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Forest Lakes averages can't show:
We read public map data around Forest Lakes — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Forest Lakes average
How we know this about Forest Lakes
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 Forest Lakes’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 Forest Lakes
When does frost risk typically end in Forest Lakes?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Forest Lakes typically lands around May 2, 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 May 23.
When is the first frost in Forest Lakes?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Forest Lakes typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 177 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Forest Lakes?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Forest Lakes sees about 177 frost-free days — roughly May 2 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 23 to Oct 12, about 142 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Forest Lakes?
The federal record around Forest Lakes is light — 15 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Nitrate entries (8), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.6 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Forest Lakes?
From about Sep 26 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 Oct 26 (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 Oct 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Forest Lakes's scale — its 7a band and its 177-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Forest Lakes'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 Forest Lakes’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Forest Lakes's own scale — its own ~177-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,744 acres it covers and 15 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Forest Lakes's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Forest Lakes's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about May 2 and Oct 26 and the ~177-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 15 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Forest Lakes, the closest Brownfields record about 0.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Forest Lakes's boundary and the 6,744 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~177-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Forest Lakes sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Mountains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Forest Lakes 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 Forest Lakes's 6,744 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Coconino County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Coconino 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 Coconino County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Forest Lakes's 6,744 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Forest Lakes you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,744 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.6 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 Forest Lakes-wide figureread your own land →