Healy, Kansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Healy, 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 Healy 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 Healy — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Healy — the short answer
Healy, Kansas: USDA zone 6a, about 189 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~189
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 6a is Healy's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Healy's 189-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Healy
Each reading below is measured for Healy itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHealy runs about 189 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
MeasuredHealy 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 Healy is in
Healy sits in the High Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Healy's own centroid rather than borrowed from Lane County.
What Grows in Healy
Every plant below cleared Healy's own zone 6a and its 189-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Healy?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 23 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Healy
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Healy. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 17S 30W 03DAB 01Nitrate · 750 ft
- HEALY OIL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- HEALY COOP ELEVATORUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- 16S 30W 27DAB 01Nitrate · 2.1 mi
- 16S 30W 22ABA 01Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- 17S 30W 20BBC 01Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- 16S 30W 21BCB 01Nitrate · 3.8 mi
- 16S 31W 25DCC 01Nitrate · 4.5 mi
- 16S 30W 13ADD 01Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- CRAMER FARMS & LIVESTOCK INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 5.0 mi
- 17S 29W 31AAA 01Nitrate · 5.4 mi
- 16S 29W 28DAB 01Nitrate · 5.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Healy'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 Healy.
Total Sites
57
within ~10 miles of Healy
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 concentrated animal feeding operations
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Healy
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Healy
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Healy, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 50 sites within ~10 miles of Healy. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Healy
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 Healy average
Your land is one point inside Healy
Everything above resolves to Healy as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Healy Average
Healy Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Healy
- ●One soil character for all of Healy
- ●Frost dates read at Healy's scale: Apr 17 to Oct 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Healy's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Healy
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Healy, Kansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Healy averages can't show:
We read public map data around Healy — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Healy average
How we know this about Healy
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 Healy’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 Healy
When does frost risk typically end in Healy?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Healy typically lands around Apr 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 May 8.
When is the first frost in Healy?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Healy typically arrives around Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 9, so the watching starts about Sep 23 — about 189 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Healy?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Healy sees about 189 frost-free days — roughly Apr 17 through Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 8 to Oct 9, about 154 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Healy?
The federal record around Healy shows 57 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (50), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.1 miles 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 I protect my plants from frost in Healy?
From about Sep 23 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 Oct 23 (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 Oct 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Healy's scale — its 6a band and its 189-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Healy'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 Healy’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Healy's own scale — its own ~189-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,214 acres it covers and 57 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Healy's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Healy's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 17 and Oct 23 and the ~189-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 57 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Healy, the closest Nitrate record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Healy's boundary and the 2,214 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~189-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Healy's own centroid, the High PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Healy's 2,214 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lane County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lane County
- The growing challenges every Kansas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kansas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Lane County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Healy's 2,214 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Healy you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,214 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.1 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 Healy-wide figureread your own land →
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