Owyhee County, in Idaho, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, blackberry, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Owyhee County lies within the Treasure Valley — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Owyhee County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Owyhee 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 Owyhee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Owyhee County — the short answer
Owyhee County, Idaho: USDA zone 6a, about 137 days between hard freezes, across 4.9M acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~137
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 4.9M 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 6a is Owyhee County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Owyhee County's 137-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Owyhee County
Across a year, Owyhee County accumulates about 1,582 growing degree days above 50°F, about 91 more than the middle Idaho county — ahead of 23 of Idaho’s 44 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 Owyhee County
Across Owyhee County, the ground is predominantly Aridisols, where Wickahoney, Arbidge, and Purdam are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.7–7.6, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Aridisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Owyhee County
The USDA soil survey maps 89% of Owyhee County as well drained — but another 6% drains differently: 3% somewhat excessively drained, 1% excessively drained.
Wickahoney is the most extensive named soil at 4% of mapped acres, then Arbidge (4%) and Purdam (3%).
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 Owyhee County
Each reading below is measured for Owyhee 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 Owyhee County are well drained, in hydrologic group D — 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 Owyhee County runs about pH 6.7–7.6, 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
MeasuredOwyhee County runs about 137 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
MeasuredOwyhee County sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Owyhee County is in
Owyhee County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Northern Basin and Range (81%) and Snake River Plain (19%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Owyhee County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Owyhee County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 137-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 Idaho profile.
Is it too late to plant in Owyhee County?
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 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Short seasons reward decisiveness — quick-maturing varieties late, hardy greens under cover, and next year’s garlic in the ground before it closes.
Documented around Owyhee County
- monarch butterfly1 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Owyhee County
USGS estimates 60,302 lb of Glyphosate on Owyhee County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (6,024 lb) and Metolachlor-s (5,699 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 Owyhee County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Owyhee County — 388 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 12 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Owyhee County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Owyhee County
Closest first, across Owyhee County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Trade DollarMining · 1.4 mi
- Owyhee RiverMining · 1.4 mi
- Lucky Boy GroupMining · 1.4 mi
- 09S 05E 04DAD1Nitrate · 17.7 mi
- US ECOLOGY IDAHO SITE ABrownfields · 17.8 mi
- USDOI BLM BRUNEAU OPEN DUMPSuperfund · 17.8 mi
- ENVIROSAFE SERVICES OF IDAHOUnderground Storage Tanks · 18.4 mi
- 07S 04E 24DCC1Nitrate · 20.3 mi
- 07S 05E 33BCC1Nitrate · 21.1 mi
- 07S 04E 10DAD1Nitrate · 21.1 mi
- 07S 05E 08BBC1Nitrate · 21.7 mi
- 07S 05E 18BCD1Nitrate · 21.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Owyhee 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 Owyhee County.
Total Sites
388
across Owyhee County
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
12 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Owyhee County
Severity Distribution
across Owyhee County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Owyhee County, two things run higher than the national average across Owyhee County — Mining (92 sites) and Superfund (12 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 Owyhee 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 Owyhee County average
Your land is one point inside Owyhee County
Everything above resolves to Owyhee County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 4.9M 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 Owyhee County Average
Owyhee County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Owyhee County
- ●One soil character for all of Owyhee County
- ●Frost dates read at Owyhee County's scale: May 20 to Oct 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Owyhee County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Owyhee County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Owyhee County, Idaho — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Owyhee County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Owyhee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Owyhee County average
How we know this about Owyhee 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 Owyhee County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Owyhee County
When does frost risk typically end in Owyhee County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Owyhee County typically lands around May 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 Jun 10.
How long is the growing season in Owyhee County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Owyhee County sees about 137 frost-free days — roughly May 20 through Oct 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Jun 10 to Sep 20, about 102 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Owyhee County?
The federal record around Owyhee County runs heavier than most — 388 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (194), the nearest Mining record about 1.4 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 Owyhee County?
With about 137 frost-free days between hard freezes, Owyhee County 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 165 to 193 days — and cold frames or low tunnels buy more. Starting transplants indoors ahead of the May 20 hard-freeze normal stretches the season without touching the calendar.
Everything above is measured at Owyhee County's scale — its 6a band and its 137-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Owyhee 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 Idaho's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Owyhee County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Owyhee County's own scale — its own ~137-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 388 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Owyhee County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Owyhee County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~137-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Owyhee CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 388 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Mining record about 1.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Owyhee County's boundary and the 4,907,646 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~137-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Owyhee County spans, Northern Basin and Range the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Owyhee County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Owyhee County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Idaho grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Idaho
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Owyhee County — the ~137 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 Owyhee County's 4,907,646 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 388 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 Owyhee Countyread your own land →