Logan County, in Colorado, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Logan County lies within the High Plains — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Logan County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Logan County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Logan County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Logan County — the short answer
Logan County, Colorado: USDA zone 5b, about 172 days between hard freezes, across 1.2M acres.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~172
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 1.2M acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 5b is Logan County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Logan County's 172-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Logan County
Across a year, Logan County accumulates about 2,716 growing degree days above 50°F, about 884 more than the middle Colorado county — ahead of 51 of Colorado’s 64 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Logan County
Across Logan County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Valent, Platner, and Rago are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.2, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
2%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Logan County
The USDA soil survey maps 72% of Logan County as well drained — but another 26% drains differently: 13% excessively drained, 6% somewhat excessively drained.
Valent is the most extensive named soil at 11% of mapped acres, then Platner (9%) and Rago (7%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Logan County
Each reading below is measured for Logan County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Logan County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Logan County runs about pH 7.0–7.2, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredLogan County runs about 172 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredLogan County sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Logan County is in
Logan County sits in the High Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Logan County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Logan County's own USDA zone 5b and its own 172-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Colorado profile.
Is it too late to plant in Logan County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 14 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around Logan County
- monarch butterfly7 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Logan County
USGS estimates 431,240 lb of Glyphosate on Logan County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (176,270 lb) and Atrazine (127,174 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Logan County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Logan County — 221 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Logan County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Logan County
Closest first, across Logan County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SB00905130DAA NAWQA 19Nitrate · 2400 ft
- SB00905131BBBNitrate · 1.4 mi
- Gerk GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- Zinks GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- A. MITCHEK CATTLE CO. #3 FDLTCAFO · 2.8 mi
- SB00905123BDD NAWQA 20Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- SB00805201CCD NAWQA 18Nitrate · 3.9 mi
- Logan County Road & Bridge - Padroni ShopUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.3 mi
- Stanley KoesterUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.6 mi
- CHS-M & M CO-OPUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- Logan County Road & Bridge DeptUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.0 mi
- A. MITCHEK CATTLE CO #1 FDLTCAFO · 6.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Logan County'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 Logan County.
Total Sites
221
across Logan County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Severity Distribution
across Logan County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Logan County, CAFO runs higher than the national average — 15 sites across Logan County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Logan County
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 Logan County average
Your land is one point inside Logan County
Everything above resolves to Logan County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 1.2M 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Logan County Average
Logan County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Logan County
- ●One soil character for all of Logan County
- ●Frost dates read at Logan County's scale: Apr 25 to Oct 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Logan County's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Logan County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Logan County, Colorado — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Logan County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Logan County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Logan County average
How we know this about Logan County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Logan County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Logan County
When does frost risk typically end in Logan County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Logan County typically lands around Apr 25, 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 May 16.
How long is the growing season in Logan County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Logan County sees about 172 frost-free days — roughly Apr 25 through Oct 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 16 to Sep 30, about 137 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Logan County?
The federal record around Logan County is a meaningful one — 221 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (119), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.5 miles 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.
Everything above is measured at Logan County's scale — its 5b band and its 172-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Logan County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Colorado's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Logan County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Logan County's own scale — its own ~172-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 221 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Logan County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Logan County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~172-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Logan CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 221 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 0.5 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Logan County's boundary and the 1,176,702 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~172-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Logan County sitting wholly inside the High PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Logan County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Logan County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Colorado grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Colorado
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Logan County — the ~172 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Logan County's 1,176,702 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 221 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Logan Countyread your own land →