San Juan Bautista, California, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
On paper, okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in San Juan Bautista, 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 San Juan Bautista 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 San Juan Bautista — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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San Juan Bautista — the short answer
San Juan Bautista, California: USDA zone 9b, about 290 days between hard freezes, across 502 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 9b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 26
- San Benito County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 13
- San Benito County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~290
- San Benito County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 502 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 San Benito County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9b is San Juan Bautista's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against San Juan Bautista's 290-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in San Juan Bautista
Each reading below is measured for San Juan Bautista itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsSan Juan Bautista runs about 290 days between hard freezes (read from San Benito County, the closest normal to San Juan Bautista) — 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
MeasuredSan Juan Bautista sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b.
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 San Juan Bautista is in
San Juan Bautista sits in the Central California Foothills and Coastal Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Mediterranean California. That is read at San Juan Bautista's own centroid rather than borrowed from San Benito County.
What Grows in San Juan Bautista
Every plant below cleared San Juan Bautista's own zone 9b and its 290-day season. Each card opens that plant's California profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in San Juan Bautista?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 29; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 26 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 13 — 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.
What's on the federal record near San Juan Bautista
Closest first, within ~10 miles of San Juan Bautista. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AT&T California - NE087Underground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- PACIFIC BELLBrownfields · 700 ft
- CITY OF SAN JUAN BAUTISTABrownfields · 1000 ft
- AROMAS SAN JUAN UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICTBrownfields · 1600 ft
- CALIFORNIA STATE PARKS SAN JUAN BAUTISTA SHPBrownfields · 2000 ft
- K & K ValeroUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- SAN BENITO COUNTY INTEGRATED WASTE MGMTBrownfields · 2100 ft
- 012S004E34N001MNitrate · 0.7 mi
- 012S004E34NU02MNitrate · 0.7 mi
- HARRIS MORAN SEED COMPBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- COKE FARMSBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- TAYLOR FARMING LLC - BREENBrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from San Juan Bautista'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 San Juan Bautista.
Total Sites
472
within ~10 miles of San Juan Bautista
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of San Juan Bautista
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of San Juan Bautista
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around San Juan Bautista, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 354 sites within ~10 miles of San Juan Bautista. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in San Juan Bautista
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 San Juan Bautista average
Your land is one point inside San Juan Bautista
Everything above resolves to San Juan Bautista as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 502 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from San Benito County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’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 city 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 San Juan Bautista Average
San Juan Bautista Average
- ●USDA Zones 9b, averaged across San Juan Bautista
- ●One soil character for all of San Juan Bautista
- ●Frost dates read at San Juan Bautista's scale: Feb 26 to Dec 13
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not San Juan Bautista's 9b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in San Juan Bautista
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in San Juan Bautista, California — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that San Juan Bautista averages can't show:
We read public map data around San Juan Bautista — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the San Juan Bautista average
How we know this about San Juan Bautista
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at San Benito 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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 San Juan Bautista
When does frost risk typically end in San Juan Bautista?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in San Juan Bautista typically lands around Feb 26, 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 19.
When is the first frost in San Juan Bautista?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in San Juan Bautista typically arrives around Dec 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 29, so the watching starts about Nov 13 — about 290 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in San Juan Bautista?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, San Juan Bautista sees about 290 frost-free days — roughly Feb 26 through Dec 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 19 to Nov 29, about 255 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in San Juan Bautista?
The federal record around San Juan Bautista is a meaningful one — 472 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (354), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 San Juan Bautista?
From about Nov 13 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 13 (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 13. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at San Juan Bautista's scale — its 9b band and its 290-day season. Your yard writes its own version of San Juan Bautista'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 San Juan Bautista’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at San Juan Bautista's own scale — the 502 acres it covers and 472 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- San Juan Bautista's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 472 documented contamination sites on the federal record near San Juan Bautista, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- San Juan Bautista's boundary and the 502 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9b and a ~290-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at San Juan Bautista's own centroid, the Central California Foothills and Coastal MountainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — San Juan Bautista has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom San Benito County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so San Juan Bautista's 502 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom San Benito County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom San Benito 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 San Benito County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among San Juan Bautista's 502 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of San Juan Bautista you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 502 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 San Juan Bautista-wide figureread your own land →
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