Hawthorne, Nevada, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Hawthorne, 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 Hawthorne 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 Hawthorne — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Hawthorne — the short answer
Hawthorne, Nevada: USDA zone 7b, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town 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 7b is Hawthorne's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Hawthorne's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Hawthorne
Each reading below is measured for Hawthorne itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHawthorne runs about 205 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
MeasuredHawthorne sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Hawthorne is in
Hawthorne sits in the Central Basin and Range — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Hawthorne's own centroid rather than borrowed from Mineral County.
What Grows in Hawthorne
Every plant below cleared Hawthorne's own zone 7b and its 205-day season. Each card opens that plant's Nevada profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Hawthorne?
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 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 1 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
What's on the federal record near Hawthorne
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Hawthorne. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Bowles Texaco IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- Western Central Petroleum IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- Hawthorne CDO Parcel 022Underground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- El Capitan Lodge & CasinoUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- Sierra Pacific Power Co-Hawthorne Facility-ClosedUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- Sierra Pacific Power CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- Hawthorne Food Mart ""76""Underground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- US Postal ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- Gregory AndalusiteMining · 1100 ft
- E-Z Serve #158Underground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- Mineral County School TransUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- Scottys Tire & AutoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Hawthorne'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 Hawthorne.
Total Sites
166
within ~10 miles of Hawthorne
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
3 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Hawthorne
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Hawthorne
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Hawthorne, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Hawthorne — Mining (29 sites) and Nitrate (100 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Hawthorne
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 Hawthorne average
Your land is one point inside Hawthorne
Everything above resolves to Hawthorne 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 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 Hawthorne Average
Hawthorne Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Hawthorne
- ●One soil character for all of Hawthorne
- ●Frost dates read at Hawthorne's scale: Apr 10 to Nov 1
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Hawthorne's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Hawthorne
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Hawthorne, Nevada — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Hawthorne averages can't show:
We read public map data around Hawthorne — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Hawthorne average
How we know this about Hawthorne
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 Hawthorne’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 Hawthorne
When does frost risk typically end in Hawthorne?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Hawthorne typically lands around Apr 10, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Hawthorne?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Hawthorne typically arrives around Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 18, so the watching starts about Oct 2 — about 205 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Hawthorne?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Hawthorne sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 18, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Hawthorne?
The federal record around Hawthorne runs heavier than most — 166 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (100), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Hawthorne?
From about Oct 2 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 Nov 1 (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 Nov 1. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Hawthorne's scale — its 7b band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Hawthorne'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 Hawthorne’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Hawthorne's own scale — its own ~205-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,126 acres it covers and 166 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Hawthorne's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Hawthorne's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Nov 1 and the ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 166 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Hawthorne, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Hawthorne's boundary and the 1,126 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Hawthorne's own centroid, the Central Basin and RangeUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Hawthorne's 1,126 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Mineral County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Mineral County
- The growing challenges every Nevada grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Nevada
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Mineral County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Hawthorne's 1,126 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Hawthorne you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,126 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Hawthorne-wide figureread your own land →
More in Nevada
Wider growing context
What grows across NevadaHawthorne sits outside our named growing regions, so Nevada as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides