Circle Pines, Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
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 Circle Pines, 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 Circle Pines 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 Circle Pines — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Circle Pines — the short answer
Circle Pines, Minnesota: USDA zone 5a, about 190 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 16
- 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
- ~190
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 1K 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 5a is Circle Pines's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Circle Pines's 190-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Circle Pines
Each reading below is measured for Circle Pines itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCircle Pines runs about 190 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
MeasuredCircle Pines sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 Circle Pines is in
Circle Pines sits in the North Central Hardwood Forests — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Circle Pines's own centroid rather than borrowed from Anoka County.
What Grows in Circle Pines
Every plant below cleared Circle Pines's own zone 5a and its 190-day season. Each card opens that plant's Minnesota profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Circle Pines?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 16 (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 Circle Pines
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Circle Pines. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- IMAGE PRINTING & GRAPHICS INCBrownfields · 1200 ft
- FOOD N FUEL C22Brownfields · 1200 ft
- GLEN OAKS DENTAL PLLPBrownfields · 1200 ft
- IMAGE PRINTING & GRAPHICS INC - CIRCLE PINESBrownfields · 1400 ft
- City Of Circle PinesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Glen Oaks Center Village PumperUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- CIRCLE PINES CITY OF - SHOPBrownfields · 1500 ft
- CIRCLE PINES DENTALBrownfields · 1600 ft
- CIRCLE PINES POST OFFICEBrownfields · 1900 ft
- CIRCLE PINES CITY OF - FIREBABrownfields · 2200 ft
- CENTENNIAL HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- VANWINKLE PAINTINGBrownfields · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Circle Pines'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 Circle Pines.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Circle Pines
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Circle Pines
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Circle Pines, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 3,211 sites within ~10 miles of Circle Pines. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Circle Pines
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 Circle Pines average
Your land is one point inside Circle Pines
Everything above resolves to Circle Pines as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Circle Pines Average
Circle Pines Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Circle Pines
- ●One soil character for all of Circle Pines
- ●Frost dates read at Circle Pines's scale: Apr 16 to Oct 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Circle Pines's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Circle Pines
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Circle Pines, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Circle Pines averages can't show:
We read public map data around Circle Pines — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Circle Pines average
How we know this about Circle Pines
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 Circle Pines’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 Circle Pines
When does frost risk typically end in Circle Pines?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Circle Pines typically lands around Apr 16, 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 7.
When is the first frost in Circle Pines?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Circle Pines 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 190 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Circle Pines?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Circle Pines sees about 190 frost-free days — roughly Apr 16 through Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 7 to Oct 9, about 155 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Circle Pines?
The federal record around Circle Pines runs heavier than most — 4,620 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (3,211), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.2 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 I protect my plants from frost in Circle Pines?
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 Circle Pines's scale — its 5a band and its 190-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Circle Pines'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 Circle Pines’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Circle Pines's own scale — its own ~190-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,119 acres it covers and 4,620 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Circle Pines's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Circle Pines's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 16 and Oct 23 and the ~190-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 4,620 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Circle Pines, the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Circle Pines's boundary and the 1,119 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~190-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Circle Pines's own centroid, the North Central Hardwood ForestsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Circle Pines's 1,119 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Anoka County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Anoka 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 Anoka County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Circle Pines's 1,119 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Circle Pines you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,119 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 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 Circle Pines-wide figureread your own land →
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