Coates, Minnesota, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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 Coates, 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 Coates 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 Coates — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Coates — the short answer
Coates, Minnesota: USDA zone 5a, about 186 days between hard freezes, across 959 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 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~186
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 959 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 Coates's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Coates's 186-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Coates
Each reading below is measured for Coates itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCoates runs about 186 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
MeasuredCoates 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 Coates is in
Coates sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Coates's own centroid rather than borrowed from Dakota County.
What Grows in Coates
Every plant below cleared Coates's own zone 5a and its 186-day season. Each card opens that plant's Minnesota profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Coates?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. 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 19 — 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 Coates
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Coates. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- A&b Coates Corner IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- Thurmes 66 ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- Irene ThurmesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- Vermillion RepairUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- 114N18W06ABA RAHNNitrate · 2600 ft
- ALPHA CONTAINER SERVICES & RECYCLINGBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- ITEQ STORAGE SYSTEMSBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- RAYFO INCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- RAYFO INCToxics Release Inventory · 0.5 mi
- OLSON CARRIERS INCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- WASTEQUIP MANUFACTURING CO LLCToxics Release Inventory · 0.6 mi
- WASTEQUIP MANUFACTURING CO LLCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Coates'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 Coates.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Coates
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Coates
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Coates, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 975 sites within ~10 miles of Coates. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Coates
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 Coates average
Your land is one point inside Coates
Everything above resolves to Coates as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 959 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 Coates Average
Coates Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Coates
- ●One soil character for all of Coates
- ●Frost dates read at Coates's scale: Apr 16 to Oct 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Coates's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Coates
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Coates, Minnesota — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Coates averages can't show:
We read public map data around Coates — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Coates average
How we know this about Coates
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 Coates’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 Coates
When does frost risk typically end in Coates?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Coates 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 Coates?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Coates typically arrives around Oct 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 5, so the watching starts about Sep 19 — about 186 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Coates?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Coates sees about 186 frost-free days — roughly Apr 16 through Oct 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 7 to Oct 5, about 151 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Coates?
The federal record around Coates runs heavier than most — 1,521 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (975), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Coates?
From about Sep 19 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Coates's scale — its 5a band and its 186-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Coates'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 Coates’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Coates's own scale — its own ~186-day season between 28°F freezes, the 959 acres it covers and 1,521 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Coates's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Coates's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 16 and Oct 19 and the ~186-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,521 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Coates, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Coates's boundary and the 959 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~186-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Coates'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 Coates's 959 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Dakota County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Dakota 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 Dakota County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Coates's 959 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Coates you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 959 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Coates-wide figureread your own land →
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