Bird Island, Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, cranberry, turkish rocket, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Bird Island, 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 Bird Island 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 Bird Island — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Bird Island — the short answer
Bird Island, Minnesota: USDA zone 4b, about 180 days between hard freezes, across 937 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 4b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~180
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 937 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 4b is Bird Island's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bird Island's 180-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bird Island
Each reading below is measured for Bird Island itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBird Island runs about 180 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
MeasuredBird Island sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b.
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 Bird Island is in
Bird Island sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Bird Island's own centroid rather than borrowed from Renville County.
What Grows in Bird Island
Every plant below cleared Bird Island's own zone 4b and its 180-day season. Each card opens that plant's Minnesota profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bird Island?
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 Mar 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 19 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 16 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
What's on the federal record near Bird Island
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bird Island. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- RENVILLE COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFBrownfields · 150 ft
- RC HOSPITAL & CLINICS - RENVILLE, RENVILLE COUNTY HOSPITALS & CLINICSBrownfields · 350 ft
- MILLER RICHARD L DDSBrownfields · 700 ft
- Wittwer Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- BOBS BODY SHOPBrownfields · 950 ft
- MICHAELS BODY SHOPBrownfields · 1200 ft
- BOLD SCHOOL BIRD ISLAND CAMPUSBrownfields · 1300 ft
- Mobile Gas StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- KIBBLE EQUIPMENT INC - BIRD IBrownfields · 1900 ft
- KIBBLE EQUIPMENT INCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Bird IslandPFAS · 1.1 mi
- Quad R FarmsUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bird Island'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 Bird Island.
Total Sites
185
within ~10 miles of Bird Island
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bird Island
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bird Island
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bird Island, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Bird Island — CAFO (10 sites) and Nitrate (92 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Bird Island
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 Bird Island average
Your land is one point inside Bird Island
Everything above resolves to Bird Island as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 937 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 Bird Island Average
Bird Island Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Bird Island
- ●One soil character for all of Bird Island
- ●Frost dates read at Bird Island's scale: Apr 19 to Oct 16
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bird Island's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bird Island
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bird Island, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bird Island averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bird Island — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bird Island average
How we know this about Bird Island
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 Bird Island’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 Bird Island
When does frost risk typically end in Bird Island?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bird Island typically lands around Apr 19, 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 10.
When is the first frost in Bird Island?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bird Island typically arrives around Oct 16, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 2, so the watching starts about Sep 16 — about 180 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bird Island?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bird Island sees about 180 frost-free days — roughly Apr 19 through Oct 16, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 10 to Oct 2, about 145 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bird Island?
The federal record around Bird Island shows 185 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (92), the nearest Brownfields 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 I protect my plants from frost in Bird Island?
From about Sep 16 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 16 (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 16. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bird Island's scale — its 4b band and its 180-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bird Island'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 Bird Island’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Bird Island's own scale — its own ~180-day season between 28°F freezes, the 937 acres it covers and 185 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bird Island's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bird Island's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 19 and Oct 16 and the ~180-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 185 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bird Island, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bird Island's boundary and the 937 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~180-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bird Island's own centroid, the Western Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bird Island's 937 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Renville County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Renville County
- The growing challenges every Minnesota grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Minnesota
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Renville County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bird Island's 937 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bird Island you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 937 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Bird Island-wide figureread your own land →
More in Minnesota
Wider growing context
What grows across MinnesotaBird Island sits outside our named growing regions, so Minnesota as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides