Blair, Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Blair, 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 Blair 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 Blair — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Blair — the short answer
Blair, Nebraska: USDA zone 5b, about 201 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~201
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 4K 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 Blair's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Blair's 201-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Blair
Each reading below is measured for Blair itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBlair runs about 201 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBlair 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 Blair is in
Blair sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Blair's own centroid rather than borrowed from Washington County.
What Grows in Blair
Every plant below cleared Blair's own zone 5b and its 201-day season. Each card opens that plant's Nebraska profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Blair?
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 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
What's on the federal record near Blair
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Blair. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- NOVOZYMESToxics Release Inventory · 750 ft
- CUBBYs BLAIRUnderground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- FAIRWAY OILUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- TAYLOR QUIK PIKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- DESOTO ENGINEERING INCBrownfields · 1500 ft
- ARPS RED-E-MIX INCBrownfields · 1600 ft
- BLAIR AMOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- CONCRETE EQUIPMENT CO IN CBrownfields · 1700 ft
- CONCRETE EQUIPMENT CO IN CToxics Release Inventory · 1700 ft
- BLAIR FLOUR MILLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1812Underground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- BI-STATE MOTOR PARTSBrownfields · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Blair'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 Blair.
Total Sites
136
within ~10 miles of Blair
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Blair
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Blair
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Blair, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 80 sites within ~10 miles of Blair. 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 Blair
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 Blair average
Your land is one point inside Blair
Everything above resolves to Blair as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 Blair Average
Blair Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Blair
- ●One soil character for all of Blair
- ●Frost dates read at Blair's scale: Apr 8 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Blair's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Blair
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Blair, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Blair averages can't show:
We read public map data around Blair — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Blair average
How we know this about Blair
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 Blair’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 Blair
When does frost risk typically end in Blair?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Blair typically lands around Apr 8, 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 Apr 29.
When is the first frost in Blair?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Blair typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 201 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Blair?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Blair sees about 201 frost-free days — roughly Apr 8 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 29 to Oct 12, about 166 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Blair?
The federal record around Blair shows 136 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (80), the nearest Toxics Release Inventory 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 Blair?
From about Sep 26 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Blair's scale — its 5b band and its 201-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Blair'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 Blair’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Blair's own scale — its own ~201-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,527 acres it covers and 136 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Blair's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Blair's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 8 and Oct 26 and the ~201-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 136 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Blair, the closest Toxics Release Inventory record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Blair's boundary and the 3,527 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~201-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Blair'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 Blair's 3,527 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Washington County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Washington County
- The growing challenges every Nebraska grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Nebraska
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Washington County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Blair's 3,527 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Blair you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,527 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Toxics Release Inventory 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 Blair-wide figureread your own land →
More in Nebraska
Wider growing context
What grows across NebraskaBlair sits outside our named growing regions, so Nebraska as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides