Taos County, in New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
On paper, cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Taos County lies within the Taos & the Sangre de Cristo High Country — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Taos County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Taos 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 Taos County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Taos County — the short answer
Taos County, New Mexico: USDA zone 5b, about 151 days between hard freezes, across 1.4M acres.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~151
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 1.4M 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 Taos County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Taos County's 151-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Taos County
Across a year, Taos County accumulates about 1,477 growing degree days above 50°F, about 1,696 fewer than the middle New Mexico county — no other New Mexico county banks fewer. 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 Taos County
Across Taos County, the ground is predominantly Aridisols, where Nambe, Fernando, and Marosa are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a cobbly loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.8, slightly alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Aridisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Taos County
The USDA soil survey maps 91% of Taos County as well drained — but another 4% drains differently: 3% somewhat excessively drained, 1% poorly drained.
Nambe is the most extensive named soil at 8% of mapped acres, then Fernando (8%) and Marosa (6%).
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 Taos County
Each reading below is measured for Taos 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 Taos County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — 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 Taos County runs about pH 7.0–7.8, on the alkaline side.
Many vegetables cope, but acid-lovers like blueberries struggle, and iron and manganese lock up above about pH 7.5 — leaves yellow between the veins even in rich soil.
Elemental sulfur and generous organic matter lower pH slowly for the beds that need it; test first so you add only what the soil actually calls for.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredTaos County runs about 151 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
MeasuredTaos 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 Taos County is in
Taos County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Arizona/New Mexico Plateau (51%) and Southern Rockies (49%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Taos County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Taos County's own USDA zone 5b and its own 151-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 New Mexico profile.
Is it too late to plant in Taos County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Apr 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 7 — 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.
Documented around Taos County
- monarch butterfly2 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Taos County
USGS estimates 4,014 lb of Glyphosate on Taos County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Dicamba (1,358 lb) and Atrazine (937 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 Taos County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Taos County — 279 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 3 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Taos County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Taos County
Closest first, across Taos County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 27N.12E.33.123Nitrate · 3.3 mi
- MIDTOWN MARKET & SPIRITSUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- TAOS GRAVEL PRODUCTS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- Portorico ProspectMining · 3.6 mi
- JARAMILLO EDMUNDO AUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- 26N.13E.04.113Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- 26N.13E.04.323Nitrate · 5.6 mi
- FORMER EL SALTO LODGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- VALDEZ ARTHUR AUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- ARROYO SECO GENERAL MERCHANDISEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- MARTINEZ LEVINIOUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- 26N.11E.01.120Nitrate · 6.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Taos 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 Taos County.
Sources Checked
across Taos County
Severity Distribution
across Taos County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Taos County, Mining runs higher than the national average — 57 sites across Taos County. 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.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Taos 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 Taos County average
Your land is one point inside Taos County
Everything above resolves to Taos County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 1.4M 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 Taos County Average
Taos County Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Taos County
- ●One soil character for all of Taos County
- ●Frost dates read at Taos County's scale: May 9 to Oct 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Taos County's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Taos County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Taos County, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Taos County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Taos County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Taos County average
How we know this about Taos 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 Taos County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Taos County
When does frost risk typically end in Taos County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Taos County typically lands around May 9, 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 30.
How long is the growing season in Taos County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Taos County sees about 151 frost-free days — roughly May 9 through Oct 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 30 to Sep 23, about 116 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Taos County?
The federal record around Taos County runs heavier than most — 279 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (116), the nearest Nitrate record about 3.3 miles 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.
Everything above is measured at Taos County's scale — its 5b band and its 151-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Taos 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 New Mexico's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Taos County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Taos County's own scale — its own ~151-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 279 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Taos County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Taos County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~151-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Taos CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 279 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 3.3 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Taos County's boundary and the 1,409,517 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~151-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Taos County spans, Arizona/New Mexico Plateau the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Taos County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Taos County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every New Mexico grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New Mexico
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Taos County — the ~151 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 Taos County's 1,409,517 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 279 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 Taos Countyread your own land →