Gisela, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Gisela, 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 Gisela 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 Gisela — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Gisela — the short answer
Gisela, Arizona: USDA zone 8b, about 298 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~298
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 Gisela's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Gisela's 298-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Gisela
Each reading below is measured for Gisela itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGisela runs about 298 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredGisela 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 Gisela is in
Gisela sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Temperate Sierras. That is read at Gisela's own centroid rather than borrowed from Gila County.
What Grows in Gisela
Every plant below cleared Gisela's own zone 8b and its 298-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Gisela?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 6 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the calendar nearly circles: cool-season crops take the winter shift, and the next window is always close.
Documented around Gisela
Survey cells within 31 miles of Gisela checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 345 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Gisela
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Gisela. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- A-09-10 24DCCNitrate · 2000 ft
- A-09-10 25CCDNitrate · 0.9 mi
- Basic Minerals PropertyMining · 3.4 mi
- PeacockMining · 3.6 mi
- Bratlin PropertyMining · 3.6 mi
- Bishop Knoll PropertyMining · 3.6 mi
- ADOT - RYEUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- RYE BAR AND STEAKHOUSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- A-09-10 20CDCNitrate · 3.8 mi
- Bishop's Knoll MineMining · 4.2 mi
- Mineral Survey 4636Mining · 4.8 mi
- Pat Walsh GroupMining · 4.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Gisela'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 Gisela.
Total Sites
175
within ~10 miles of Gisela
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Gisela
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Gisela
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Gisela, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Gisela — Mining (34 sites) and Nitrate (92 sites). 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Gisela
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 Gisela average
Your land is one point inside Gisela
Everything above resolves to Gisela as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Gisela Average
Gisela Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Gisela
- ●One soil character for all of Gisela
- ●Frost dates read at Gisela's scale: Feb 11 to Dec 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Gisela's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Gisela
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Gisela, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Gisela averages can't show:
We read public map data around Gisela — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Gisela average
How we know this about Gisela
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 Gisela’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 Gisela
When does frost risk typically end in Gisela?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Gisela typically lands around Feb 11, 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 4.
When is the first frost in Gisela?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Gisela typically arrives around Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 22, so the watching starts about Nov 6 — about 298 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Gisela?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Gisela sees about 298 frost-free days — roughly Feb 11 through Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 4 to Nov 22, about 263 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Gisela?
The federal record around Gisela is a meaningful one — 175 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (92), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Gisela?
From about Nov 6 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Gisela's scale — its 8b band and its 298-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Gisela'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 Gisela’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Gisela's own scale — its own ~298-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,832 acres it covers and 175 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Gisela's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Gisela's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Feb 11 and Dec 6 and the ~298-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 175 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Gisela, the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Gisela's boundary and the 1,832 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~298-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Gisela's own centroid, the Arizona/New Mexico MountainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Gisela 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 Gisela's 1,832 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 Gisela's 1,832 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Gisela you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,832 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 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 Gisela-wide figureread your own land →
More in Arizona
Wider growing context
What grows across ArizonaGisela sits outside our named growing regions, so Arizona as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides