Golden Valley, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Crops well matched to these conditions include artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Golden Valley, 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 Golden Valley 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 Golden Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Golden Valley — the short answer
Golden Valley, Arizona: USDA zone 9a, about 242 days between hard freezes, across 50K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 21
- Mohave County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 18
- Mohave County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~242
- Mohave County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 50K 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 Mohave County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Golden Valley's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Golden Valley's 242-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Golden Valley
Each reading below is measured for Golden Valley itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsGolden Valley runs about 242 days between hard freezes (read from Mohave County, the closest normal to Golden Valley) — 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
MeasuredGolden Valley 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 Golden Valley is in
Golden Valley sits in the Mojave Basin and Range — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Golden Valley's own centroid rather than borrowed from Mohave County.
What Grows in Golden Valley
Every plant below cleared Golden Valley's own zone 9a and its 242-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Golden Valley?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 21; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 21 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 18 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Golden Valley
Survey cells within 31 miles of Golden Valley checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 220 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Golden Valley
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Golden Valley. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- B-21-19 13DDDNitrate · 1.3 mi
- B-21-18 08BBB2Nitrate · 1.5 mi
- GOLDEN VALLEY SHELLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- GOLDEN VALLEY PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- B-21-18 09BBANitrate · 1.8 mi
- GOLDEN VALLEY FIRE DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- B-21-18 05DBDNitrate · 2.0 mi
- MAVERIK COUNTRY STORE #376Underground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- TRIDECON INCBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- B-21-18 32BBBNitrate · 2.6 mi
- GOLDEN VALLEY IMPROVEMENT DISTRICTPFAS · 2.8 mi
- Old Mint MineMining · 3.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Golden Valley'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 Golden Valley.
Total Sites
139
within ~10 miles of Golden Valley
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Golden Valley
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Golden Valley
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Golden Valley, Mining runs higher than the national average — 55 sites within ~10 miles of Golden Valley. 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 Golden Valley
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 Golden Valley average
Your land is one point inside Golden Valley
Everything above resolves to Golden Valley as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 50K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Mohave 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 Golden Valley Average
Golden Valley Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Golden Valley
- ●One soil character for all of Golden Valley
- ●Frost dates read at Golden Valley's scale: Mar 21 to Nov 18
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Golden Valley's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Golden Valley
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Golden Valley, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Golden Valley averages can't show:
We read public map data around Golden Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Golden Valley average
How we know this about Golden Valley
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 Mohave 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 Golden Valley
When does frost risk typically end in Golden Valley?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Golden Valley typically lands around Mar 21, 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 11.
When is the first frost in Golden Valley?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Golden Valley typically arrives around Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 4, so the watching starts about Oct 19 — about 242 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Golden Valley?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Golden Valley sees about 242 frost-free days — roughly Mar 21 through Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 11 to Nov 4, about 207 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Golden Valley?
The federal record around Golden Valley runs heavier than most — 139 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (55), the nearest Nitrate record about 1.3 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 Golden Valley?
From about Oct 19 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 18 (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 18. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Golden Valley's scale — its 9a band and its 242-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Golden Valley'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 Golden Valley’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Golden Valley's own scale — the 50,397 acres it covers and 139 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Golden Valley's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 139 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Golden Valley, the closest Nitrate record about 1.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Golden Valley's boundary and the 50,397 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~242-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Golden Valley's own centroid, the Mojave Basin and RangeUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Golden Valley checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Golden Valley has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Mohave County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Golden Valley's 50,397 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Mohave County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Mohave 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 Mohave County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Golden Valley's 50,397 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Golden Valley you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 50,397 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 1.3 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 Golden Valley-wide figureread your own land →
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