Guide Rock, Nebraska, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Guide Rock, 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 Guide Rock 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 Guide Rock — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Guide Rock — the short answer
Guide Rock, Nebraska: USDA zone 6a, about 189 days between hard freezes, across 321 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~189
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 321 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 6a is Guide Rock's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Guide Rock's 189-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Guide Rock
Each reading below is measured for Guide Rock itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGuide Rock runs about 189 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
MeasuredGuide Rock sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Guide Rock is in
Guide Rock sits in the Central Great Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Guide Rock's own centroid rather than borrowed from Webster County.
What Grows in Guide Rock
Every plant below cleared Guide Rock's own zone 6a and its 189-day season. Each card opens that plant's Nebraska profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Guide Rock?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 14 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 20 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
What's on the federal record near Guide Rock
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Guide Rock. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TROUDTs SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 550 ft
- 1N 9W 9CC 1Nitrate · 1.3 mi
- COUNTRY CORNERUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- 1N 8W17DA 1Nitrate · 4.9 mi
- 01S 09W 16AAA 01Nitrate · 7.0 mi
- 01S 09W 14BBA 01Nitrate · 7.1 mi
- 01S 10W 03ABA 01Nitrate · 7.5 mi
- 2N 10W 4AC 1Nitrate · 9.3 mi
- 01S 08W 02CCD 01Nitrate · 9.4 mi
- 01S 08W 16CCD 01Nitrate · 9.5 mi
- GOTTSCH FEEDING CORP. - RED CLOUDCAFO · 9.9 mi
- CPI/MR TIREUnderground Storage Tanks · 10.0 mi
Measured from Guide Rock'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 Guide Rock.
Total Sites
20
within ~10 miles of Guide Rock
Risk Level
Low
Highest-severity
1 concentrated animal feeding operation
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Guide Rock
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Guide Rock
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Large animal operations push nitrates and bacteria downstream. Below one, test your water.
Check your specific parcel in Guide Rock
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 Guide Rock average
Your land is one point inside Guide Rock
Everything above resolves to Guide Rock as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 321 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 town 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 Guide Rock Average
Guide Rock Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Guide Rock
- ●One soil character for all of Guide Rock
- ●Frost dates read at Guide Rock's scale: Apr 14 to Oct 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Guide Rock's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Guide Rock
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Guide Rock, Nebraska — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Guide Rock averages can't show:
We read public map data around Guide Rock — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Guide Rock average
How we know this about Guide Rock
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Guide Rock’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 town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-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 Guide Rock
When does frost risk typically end in Guide Rock?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Guide Rock typically lands around Apr 14, 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 5.
When is the first frost in Guide Rock?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Guide Rock typically arrives around Oct 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 6, so the watching starts about Sep 20 — about 189 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Guide Rock?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Guide Rock sees about 189 frost-free days — roughly Apr 14 through Oct 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 5 to Oct 6, about 154 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Guide Rock?
The federal record around Guide Rock is light — 20 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Nitrate entries (16), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Guide Rock?
From about Sep 20 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Guide Rock's scale — its 6a band and its 189-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Guide Rock'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 Guide Rock’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Guide Rock's own scale — its own ~189-day season between 28°F freezes, the 321 acres it covers and 20 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Guide Rock's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Guide Rock's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 14 and Oct 20 and the ~189-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 20 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Guide Rock, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Guide Rock's boundary and the 321 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~189-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Guide Rock's own centroid, the Central Great PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Guide Rock's 321 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Webster County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Webster 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 Webster County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Guide Rock's 321 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Guide Rock you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 321 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Guide Rock-wide figureread your own land →
More in Nebraska
Wider growing context
What grows across NebraskaGuide Rock sits outside our named growing regions, so Nebraska as a whole is its closest context here.