Rollinsville, Colorado, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Rollinsville, 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 Rollinsville 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 Rollinsville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Rollinsville — the short answer
Rollinsville, Colorado: USDA zone 5b, about 134 days between hard freezes, across 904 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Sep 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~134
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 904 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 5b is Rollinsville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Rollinsville's 134-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Rollinsville
Each reading below is measured for Rollinsville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRollinsville runs about 134 days between hard freezes — a short growing season.
Long-maturing crops like melons, sweet potatoes, and winter squash can run out of runway before the first hard freeze, ripening late or not at all.
Lead with fast-maturing varieties, and stretch the season on both ends with cold frames, low tunnels, or a greenhouse.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredRollinsville 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 Rollinsville is in
Rollinsville sits in the Southern Rockies — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northwestern Forested Mountains. That is read at Rollinsville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Gilpin County.
What Grows in Rollinsville
Every plant below cleared Rollinsville's own zone 5b and its 134-day season. Each card opens that plant's Colorado profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Rollinsville?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Apr 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Sep 28 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. When the window is tight, the fall moves are quick ones — baby greens, radishes, and garlic set for next season.
What's on the federal record near Rollinsville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Rollinsville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- XLN - 6Nitrate · 2100 ft
- Stagestop ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- Pete's Beaver Park InnUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- Gilpin County Road & BridgeUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- Tacoma TunnelMining · 1.0 mi
- StarMining · 1.2 mi
- NewportMining · 1.3 mi
- Iowa Girl LodeMining · 1.3 mi
- Champion, Lone StarMining · 1.3 mi
- ChampionMining · 1.3 mi
- Twin SistersMining · 1.4 mi
- Lone StarMining · 1.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Rollinsville'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 Rollinsville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Rollinsville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Rollinsville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Rollinsville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Rollinsville — Mining (268 sites) and Superfund (5 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Rollinsville
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 Rollinsville average
Your land is one point inside Rollinsville
Everything above resolves to Rollinsville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 904 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 Rollinsville Average
Rollinsville Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Rollinsville
- ●One soil character for all of Rollinsville
- ●Frost dates read at Rollinsville's scale: May 17 to Sep 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Rollinsville's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Rollinsville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Rollinsville, Colorado — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Rollinsville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Rollinsville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Rollinsville average
How we know this about Rollinsville
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 Rollinsville’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 Rollinsville
When does frost risk typically end in Rollinsville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Rollinsville typically lands around May 17, 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 Jun 7.
When is the first frost in Rollinsville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Rollinsville typically arrives around Sep 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Sep 14, so the watching starts about Aug 29 — about 134 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Rollinsville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Rollinsville sees about 134 frost-free days — roughly May 17 through Sep 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Jun 7 to Sep 14, about 99 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Rollinsville?
The federal record around Rollinsville runs heavier than most — 384 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (268), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles 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 gardeners stretch the season in Rollinsville?
With about 134 frost-free days between hard freezes, Rollinsville rewards the classic extension moves: floating row cover buys roughly two to four extra weeks at each shoulder — on this season that is a working window nearer 162 to 190 days — and cold frames or low tunnels buy more. Starting transplants indoors ahead of the May 17 hard-freeze normal stretches the season without touching the calendar.
Everything above is measured at Rollinsville's scale — its 5b band and its 134-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Rollinsville'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 Rollinsville’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Rollinsville's own scale — its own ~134-day season between 28°F freezes, the 904 acres it covers and 384 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Rollinsville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Rollinsville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about May 17 and Sep 28 and the ~134-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 384 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Rollinsville, the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Rollinsville's boundary and the 904 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~134-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Rollinsville's own centroid, the Southern RockiesUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Rollinsville's 904 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Gilpin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Gilpin County
- The growing challenges every Colorado grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Colorado
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Gilpin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Rollinsville's 904 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Rollinsville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 904 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 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 Rollinsville-wide figureread your own land →