Salado, Arkansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Salado, 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 Salado 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 Salado — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Salado — the short answer
Salado, Arkansas: USDA zone 7b, about 249 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~249
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 7b is Salado's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Salado's 249-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Salado
Each reading below is measured for Salado itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSalado runs about 249 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredSalado sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Salado is in
Salado sits in the Ozark Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Salado's own centroid rather than borrowed from Independence County.
What Grows in Salado
Every plant below cleared Salado's own zone 7b and its 249-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arkansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Salado?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Salado
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Salado. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SALADO GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- JACK'S K-MUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- JACKIE LEE'SUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- SOUTHSIDE CONOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- HARP'S #143Underground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- SOUTHSIDE GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- AHTD- DISTRICT 5 AREA HQUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- AHTD-DISTRICT 5 HEADQUARTERSBrownfields · 2.5 mi
- 12N06W03BBC1Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- GEORGE RUTHERFORD FARMUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
- UNITED PARCEL SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- UNITED PARCEL SERVICE - BATESVILLEBrownfields · 3.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Salado'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 Salado.
Total Sites
198
within ~10 miles of Salado
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
15 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Salado
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Salado
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Salado, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Salado — PFAS (3 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (15 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Salado
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 Salado average
Your land is one point inside Salado
Everything above resolves to Salado as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Salado Average
Salado Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Salado
- ●One soil character for all of Salado
- ●Frost dates read at Salado's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Salado's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Salado
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Salado, Arkansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Salado averages can't show:
We read public map data around Salado — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Salado average
How we know this about Salado
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 Salado’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 Salado
When does frost risk typically end in Salado?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Salado typically lands around Mar 15, 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 5.
When is the first frost in Salado?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Salado typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 249 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Salado?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Salado sees about 249 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Nov 5, about 214 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Salado?
The federal record around Salado shows 198 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (138), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.7 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Salado?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Salado's scale — its 7b band and its 249-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Salado'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 Salado’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Salado's own scale — its own ~249-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,267 acres it covers and 198 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Salado's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Salado's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 15 and Nov 19 and the ~249-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 198 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Salado, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Salado's boundary and the 1,267 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~249-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Salado's own centroid, the Ozark HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Salado's 1,267 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Independence County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Independence County
- The growing challenges every Arkansas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Arkansas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Independence County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Salado's 1,267 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Salado you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,267 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.7 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 Salado-wide figureread your own land →
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