Cliff, New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cliff, 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 Cliff 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 Cliff — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Cliff — the short answer
Cliff, New Mexico: USDA zone 7b, about 213 days between hard freezes, across 7K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~213
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 7K 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 Cliff's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cliff's 213-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cliff
Each reading below is measured for Cliff itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCliff runs about 213 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
MeasuredCliff 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 Cliff is in
Cliff sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Temperate Sierras. That is read at Cliff's own centroid rather than borrowed from Grant County.
What Grows in Cliff
Every plant below cleared Cliff's own zone 7b and its 213-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cliff?
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 10; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — 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.
Documented around Cliff
Survey cells within 31 miles of Cliff checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 496 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cliff
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cliff. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 15S.17W.29.442Nitrate · 1000 ft
- CLIFF TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- 15S.17W.28.331Nitrate · 2000 ft
- HOLLIMON JTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- 15S.17W.27.111Nitrate · 1.5 mi
- NMDOT CLIFF PATROL YARD 41 44Underground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- RIVERSIDE EXXONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- PACIFIC WESTERN LAND CO AIRPORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- CLIFF ELEMENTARY AND HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 2.3 mi
- 16S.17W.09.242Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- 15S.17W.26.323Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- 15S.18W.04.211Nitrate · 6.9 mi
5 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cliff'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 Cliff.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cliff
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cliff
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cliff, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 18 sites within ~10 miles of Cliff. 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 Cliff
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 Cliff average
Your land is one point inside Cliff
Everything above resolves to Cliff as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 7K 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 Cliff Average
Cliff Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Cliff
- ●One soil character for all of Cliff
- ●Frost dates read at Cliff's scale: Apr 7 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cliff's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cliff
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cliff, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cliff averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cliff — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cliff average
How we know this about Cliff
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 Cliff’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 Cliff
When does frost risk typically end in Cliff?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cliff typically lands around Apr 7, 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 28.
When is the first frost in Cliff?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cliff typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 213 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cliff?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cliff sees about 213 frost-free days — roughly Apr 7 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 28 to Oct 23, about 178 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cliff?
The federal record around Cliff shows 26 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (18), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.2 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 Cliff?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cliff's scale — its 7b band and its 213-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cliff'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 Cliff’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cliff's own scale — its own ~213-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,562 acres it covers and 26 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cliff's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cliff's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 7 and Nov 6 and the ~213-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 26 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cliff, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cliff's boundary and the 6,562 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~213-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cliff's own centroid, the Arizona/New Mexico MountainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Cliff checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cliff's 6,562 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Grant County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Grant County
- The growing challenges every New Mexico grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New Mexico
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Grant County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cliff's 6,562 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cliff you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,562 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Cliff-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Mexico
Wider growing context
What grows across New MexicoCliff sits outside our named growing regions, so New Mexico as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides