Cheyenne County, in Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Cheyenne County lies within the Nebraska Panhandle and the High Plains — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Cheyenne County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Cheyenne County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Cheyenne County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Cheyenne County — the short answer
Cheyenne County, Nebraska: USDA zone 5b, about 165 days between hard freezes, across 765K acres.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~165
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 765K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 Cheyenne County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cheyenne County's 165-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Cheyenne County
Across a year, Cheyenne County accumulates about 2,412 growing degree days above 50°F, about 428 fewer than the middle Nebraska county — ahead of 6 of Nebraska’s 93 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Cheyenne County
Across Cheyenne County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Alliance, Kuma, and Duroc are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.2, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Cheyenne County
The USDA soil survey maps 94% of Cheyenne County as well drained — but another 6% drains differently: 3% excessively drained, 2% somewhat excessively drained.
Alliance is the most extensive named soil at 14% of mapped acres, then Kuma (13%) and Duroc (11%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Cheyenne County
Each reading below is measured for Cheyenne County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Cheyenne County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Cheyenne County runs about pH 7.0–7.2, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredCheyenne County runs about 165 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
MeasuredCheyenne County 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 Cheyenne County is in
Cheyenne County sits in the High Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Cheyenne County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Cheyenne County's own USDA zone 5b and its own 165-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Nebraska profile.
Is it too late to plant in Cheyenne County?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Apr 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 12 — 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.
Documented around Cheyenne County
- monarch butterfly129 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Cheyenne County
USGS estimates 299,203 lb of Glyphosate on Cheyenne County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (163,288 lb) and Atrazine (63,615 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Cheyenne County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Cheyenne County — 151 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Cheyenne County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Cheyenne County
Closest first, across Cheyenne County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 14N 50W 2DC 3Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- 14N 50W 2DC 1Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- 14N 50W 2DC 2Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- 14N 50W 1AADD1Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- 14N 50W 1AADD2Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- PROGRESS RAIL SERVICES CORPBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA HIGHPLAINS AG LABBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- 14N 50W 1DDDA1Nitrate · 1.1 mi
- 14N 50W 1DDDA2Nitrate · 1.1 mi
- 15N 50W35AC 1Nitrate · 1.1 mi
- 15N 50W35ACC 1Nitrate · 1.2 mi
- 15N 50W35ACC 2Nitrate · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cheyenne County'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 Cheyenne County.
Total Sites
151
across Cheyenne County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Cheyenne County
Severity Distribution
across Cheyenne County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cheyenne County, two things run higher than the national average across Cheyenne County — Superfund (6 sites) and CAFO (3 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Cheyenne County
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 Cheyenne County average
Your land is one point inside Cheyenne County
Everything above resolves to Cheyenne County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 765K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Cheyenne County Average
Cheyenne County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Cheyenne County
- ●One soil character for all of Cheyenne County
- ●Frost dates read at Cheyenne County's scale: Apr 30 to Oct 12
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cheyenne County's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Cheyenne County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cheyenne County, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cheyenne County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cheyenne County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cheyenne County average
How we know this about Cheyenne County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Cheyenne County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Cheyenne County
When does frost risk typically end in Cheyenne County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cheyenne County typically lands around Apr 30, 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 21.
How long is the growing season in Cheyenne County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cheyenne County sees about 165 frost-free days — roughly Apr 30 through Oct 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 21 to Sep 28, about 130 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cheyenne County?
The federal record around Cheyenne County is a meaningful one — 151 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (82), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.7 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
Everything above is measured at Cheyenne County's scale — its 5b band and its 165-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cheyenne County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Nebraska's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Cheyenne County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Cheyenne County's own scale — its own ~165-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 151 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cheyenne County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cheyenne County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~165-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Cheyenne CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 151 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 0.7 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Cheyenne County's boundary and the 765,444 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~165-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Cheyenne County sitting wholly inside the High PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Cheyenne County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Cheyenne County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Nebraska grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Nebraska
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Cheyenne County — the ~165 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cheyenne County's 765,444 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 151 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Cheyenne Countyread your own land →