Tubac, Arizona, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
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 Tubac, 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 Tubac 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 Tubac — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Tubac — the short answer
Tubac, Arizona: USDA zone 8b, about 279 days between hard freezes, across 7K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~279
- 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 8b is Tubac's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Tubac's 279-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Tubac
Each reading below is measured for Tubac itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredTubac runs about 279 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
MeasuredTubac 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 Tubac is in
Tubac sits in the Madrean Archipelago — EPA Level III, inside the wider Southern Semi-arid Highlands. That is read at Tubac's own centroid rather than borrowed from Santa Cruz County.
What Grows in Tubac
Every plant below cleared Tubac's own zone 8b and its 279-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arizona profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Tubac?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 25; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 22 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 28 — 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 Tubac
Survey cells within 31 miles of Tubac checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 373 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Tubac
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Tubac. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- GARTER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- TUBAC MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- D-21-13 07ABBNitrate · 0.8 mi
- TUBAC SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- SCOTTY TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- D-21-13 19CDBNitrate · 1.9 mi
- TUMACACORI MINI MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- D-21-13 20CDDNitrate · 2.4 mi
- D-20-13 32BCCNitrate · 2.6 mi
- D-21-13 30DCA1Nitrate · 2.9 mi
- D-21-13 30CDANitrate · 3.0 mi
- TUMACACORI NATIONAL HISTORIC PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Tubac'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 Tubac.
Total Sites
68
within ~10 miles of Tubac
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Tubac
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Tubac
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Tubac, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Tubac — Mining (27 sites) and Nitrate (24 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 Tubac
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 Tubac average
Your land is one point inside Tubac
Everything above resolves to Tubac 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 Tubac Average
Tubac Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Tubac
- ●One soil character for all of Tubac
- ●Frost dates read at Tubac's scale: Feb 22 to Nov 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Tubac's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Tubac
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Tubac, Arizona — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Tubac averages can't show:
We read public map data around Tubac — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Tubac average
How we know this about Tubac
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 Tubac’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 Tubac
When does frost risk typically end in Tubac?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Tubac typically lands around Feb 22, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Tubac?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Tubac typically arrives around Nov 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 14, so the watching starts about Oct 29 — about 279 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Tubac?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Tubac sees about 279 frost-free days — roughly Feb 22 through Nov 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 15 to Nov 14, about 244 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Tubac?
The federal record around Tubac runs heavier than most — 68 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (27), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Tubac?
From about Oct 29 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 28 (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 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Tubac's scale — its 8b band and its 279-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Tubac'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 Tubac’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Tubac's own scale — its own ~279-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,942 acres it covers and 68 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Tubac's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Tubac's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Feb 22 and Nov 28 and the ~279-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 68 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Tubac, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Tubac's boundary and the 6,942 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~279-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Tubac's own centroid, the Madrean ArchipelagoUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Tubac 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 Tubac's 6,942 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Santa Cruz County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Santa Cruz 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 Santa Cruz County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Tubac's 6,942 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Tubac you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,942 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Tubac-wide figureread your own land →
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