Murphys, California, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Murphys, 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 Murphys 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 Murphys — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Murphys — the short answer
Murphys, California: USDA zone 9a, about 290 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~290
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 3K 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 9a is Murphys's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Murphys's 290-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Murphys
Each reading below is measured for Murphys itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMurphys runs about 290 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
MeasuredMurphys 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 Murphys is in
Murphys sits in the Sierra Nevada — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northwestern Forested Mountains. That is read at Murphys's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Calaveras County is mostly Central California Foothills and Coastal Mountains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Murphys
Every plant below cleared Murphys's own zone 9a and its 290-day season. Each card opens that plant's California profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Murphys?
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 Jan 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 7 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With almost year-round growing weather, timing is about heat and rainfall more than frost — some bench is always in play.
What's on the federal record near Murphys
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Murphys. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CCWD - EBBETTS PASSPFAS · 25 ft
- JOSEPH M SENN CONSTRUCTION INCBrownfields · 2200 ft
- WADE'S HEAVY EQUIPMENT REPAIR INC DBA ADVENTURE HOSE & TRACTOR REPAIRBrownfields · 2400 ft
- Colonial Energy CE 40137 (formerly Tower Mart #890)Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- KDR ENTERPRISES DBA MURPHYS STATIONBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Murphys StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- KEITH'S AUTOMOTIVE & TIREBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- NORTHERN CALIF POWER AGENCY/HYDRO_ADMINBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- PACIFIC BELLBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- Murphy Divide MineMining · 0.9 mi
- ROBERTS ANALYTICAL INC DBA MICRO CHEMBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- INSIGHT MANUFACTURING SERVICESBrownfields · 0.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Murphys'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 Murphys.
Total Sites
194
within ~10 miles of Murphys
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Murphys
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Murphys
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Murphys, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Murphys — Mining (52 sites) and PFAS (3 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.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Murphys
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 Murphys average
Your land is one point inside Murphys
Everything above resolves to Murphys as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 3K 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 Murphys Average
Murphys Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Murphys
- ●One soil character for all of Murphys
- ●Frost dates read at Murphys's scale: Feb 20 to Dec 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Murphys's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Murphys
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Murphys, California — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Murphys averages can't show:
We read public map data around Murphys — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Murphys average
How we know this about Murphys
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 Murphys’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 Murphys
When does frost risk typically end in Murphys?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Murphys typically lands around Feb 20, 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 13.
When is the first frost in Murphys?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Murphys typically arrives around Dec 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 23, so the watching starts about Nov 7 — about 290 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Murphys?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Murphys sees about 290 frost-free days — roughly Feb 20 through Dec 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 13 to Nov 23, about 255 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Murphys?
The federal record around Murphys runs heavier than most — 194 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (117), the nearest PFAS record under a tenth of a mile 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 Murphys?
From about Nov 7 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 7 (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 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Murphys's scale — its 9a band and its 290-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Murphys'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 Murphys’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Murphys's own scale — its own ~290-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,472 acres it covers and 194 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Murphys's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Murphys's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Feb 20 and Dec 7 and the ~290-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 194 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Murphys, the closest PFAS record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Murphys's boundary and the 3,472 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~290-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Murphys sits in the Sierra Nevada — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Murphys's 3,472 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Calaveras County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Calaveras County
- The growing challenges every California grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom California
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Calaveras County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Murphys's 3,472 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Murphys you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,472 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest PFAS record under a tenth of a mile 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 Murphys-wide figureread your own land →