New Meadows, Idaho, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in New Meadows, 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 New Meadows 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 New Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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New Meadows — the short answer
New Meadows, Idaho: USDA zone 5b, about 127 days between hard freezes, across 374 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Sep 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~127
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 374 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 New Meadows's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against New Meadows's 127-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in New Meadows
Each reading below is measured for New Meadows itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNew Meadows runs about 127 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
MeasuredNew Meadows 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 New Meadows is in
New Meadows sits in the Idaho Batholith — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northwestern Forested Mountains. That is read at New Meadows's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Adams County is mostly Blue Mountains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in New Meadows
Every plant below cleared New Meadows's own zone 5b and its 127-day season. Each card opens that plant's Idaho profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in New Meadows?
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 Apr 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 18 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Sep 22 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even here the calendar’s edges hold value: thirty-day greens late in the window, then garlic and a rested bed for spring.
What's on the federal record near New Meadows
Closest first, within ~10 miles of New Meadows. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- F & H SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- BROWN'S MTN. MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- MALVICH LOGGING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- NEW MEADOWS RANGER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- 19N 01E 24BCA1Nitrate · 850 ft
- Turning Point ChevronUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- 19N 02E 29BBD1Nitrate · 2.1 mi
- 19N 01E 36CCB1Nitrate · 2.4 mi
- 19N 02E 29ADB1Nitrate · 2.7 mi
- 18N 01E 02ABD1Nitrate · 2.8 mi
- GOOSE CREEK STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
- STEPHEN HACKLERUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from New Meadows'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 New Meadows.
Total Sites
62
within ~10 miles of New Meadows
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of New Meadows
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of New Meadows
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around New Meadows, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of New Meadows — Mining (8 sites) and Nitrate (22 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in New Meadows
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 New Meadows average
Your land is one point inside New Meadows
Everything above resolves to New Meadows as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 374 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 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 New Meadows Average
New Meadows Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across New Meadows
- ●One soil character for all of New Meadows
- ●Frost dates read at New Meadows's scale: May 18 to Sep 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not New Meadows's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in New Meadows
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in New Meadows, Idaho — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that New Meadows averages can't show:
We read public map data around New Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the New Meadows average
How we know this about New Meadows
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 New Meadows’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 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 New Meadows
When does frost risk typically end in New Meadows?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in New Meadows typically lands around May 18, 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 8.
When is the first frost in New Meadows?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in New Meadows typically arrives around Sep 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Sep 8, so the watching starts about Aug 23 — about 127 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in New Meadows?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, New Meadows sees about 127 frost-free days — roughly May 18 through Sep 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Jun 8 to Sep 8, about 92 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in New Meadows?
The federal record around New Meadows shows 62 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (28), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do gardeners stretch the season in New Meadows?
With about 127 frost-free days between hard freezes, New Meadows 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 155 to 183 days — and cold frames or low tunnels buy more. Starting transplants indoors ahead of the May 18 hard-freeze normal stretches the season without touching the calendar.
Everything above is measured at New Meadows's scale — its 5b band and its 127-day season. Your yard writes its own version of New Meadows'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 New Meadows’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at New Meadows's own scale — its own ~127-day season between 28°F freezes, the 374 acres it covers and 62 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- New Meadows's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- New Meadows's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about May 18 and Sep 22 and the ~127-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 62 documented contamination sites on the federal record near New Meadows, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- New Meadows's boundary and the 374 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~127-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- New Meadows sits in the Idaho Batholith — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so New Meadows's 374 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Adams County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Adams County
- The growing challenges every Idaho grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Idaho
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Adams County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among New Meadows's 374 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of New Meadows you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 374 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 New Meadows-wide figureread your own land →
More in Idaho
Wider growing context
What grows across IdahoNew Meadows sits outside our named growing regions, so Idaho as a whole is its closest context here.