Winterhaven, California, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, avocado, meyer lemon, tomato, and artichoke all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Winterhaven, 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 Winterhaven 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 Winterhaven — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Winterhaven — the short answer
Winterhaven, California: USDA zone 10a, about 344 days between hard freezes, across 156 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 10a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 15
- Imperial County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 25
- Imperial County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~344
- Imperial County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 156 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 Imperial County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 10a is Winterhaven's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Winterhaven's 344-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Winterhaven
Each reading below is measured for Winterhaven itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsWinterhaven runs about 344 days between hard freezes (read from Imperial County, the closest normal to Winterhaven) — 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
MeasuredWinterhaven sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a.
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 Winterhaven is in
Winterhaven sits in the Sonoran Basin and Range — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Winterhaven's own centroid rather than borrowed from Imperial County.
What Grows in Winterhaven
Plants matched to Winterhaven's USDA zones 10a, ordered by how much hardiness margin each has here — the ones with room to spare at both ends of this town's band lead. Each links to its full growing profile.
Is it too late to plant in Winterhaven?
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 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 25 — 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 Winterhaven
Survey cells within 31 miles of Winterhaven checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 150 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Winterhaven
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Winterhaven. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 016S022E27K004SNitrate · 450 ft
- SHIPPS AUTO SALVAGEBrownfields · 700 ft
- CALIFORNIA STATE PARKS PICACHO SRABrownfields · 950 ft
- 016S022E27H001SNitrate · 1300 ft
- 016S022E26E001SNitrate · 1600 ft
- AUTO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- USDOI BR - QUARTERMASTER DEPOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- LLANTERA EL CACHANILLAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- EXXONMOBIL OIL CORPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- USF&W - KOFA NWR ADMINISTRATION OFFICESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CIRCLE K #2701930Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- US BORDER PATROL SECTORSuperfund · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Winterhaven'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 Winterhaven.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Winterhaven
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Winterhaven
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Winterhaven, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Winterhaven — Superfund (8 sites) and Nitrate (136 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Winterhaven
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 Winterhaven average
Your land is one point inside Winterhaven
Everything above resolves to Winterhaven as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 156 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Imperial 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 Winterhaven Average
Winterhaven Average
- ●USDA Zones 10a, averaged across Winterhaven
- ●One soil character for all of Winterhaven
- ●Frost dates read at Winterhaven's scale: Jan 15 to Dec 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Winterhaven's 10a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Winterhaven
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Winterhaven, California — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Winterhaven averages can't show:
We read public map data around Winterhaven — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Winterhaven average
How we know this about Winterhaven
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 Imperial 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 Winterhaven
When does frost risk typically end in Winterhaven?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Winterhaven typically lands around Jan 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 Feb 5.
When is the first frost in Winterhaven?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Winterhaven typically arrives around Dec 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Dec 11, so the watching starts about Nov 25 — about 344 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Winterhaven?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Winterhaven sees about 344 frost-free days — roughly Jan 15 through Dec 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 5 to Dec 11, about 309 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Winterhaven?
The federal record around Winterhaven is a meaningful one — 502 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (243), the nearest Nitrate 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 Winterhaven?
From about Nov 25 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 25 (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 25. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Winterhaven's scale — its 10a band and its 344-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Winterhaven'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 Winterhaven’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Winterhaven's own scale — the 156 acres it covers and 502 documented sites around it; 6 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Winterhaven's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 502 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Winterhaven, the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Winterhaven's boundary and the 156 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- The ecoregion at Winterhaven's own centroid, the Sonoran Basin and RangeUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Winterhaven checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Winterhaven has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Imperial County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Winterhaven's 156 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Imperial County
- The candidate plant list — California's curated set, filtered to this zone band and re-ordered by how much margin each has herefrom California
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Imperial 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 Imperial County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Winterhaven's 156 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Winterhaven you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 156 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Winterhaven-wide figureread your own land →