Holloman AFB, New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Holloman AFB, 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 Holloman AFB 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 Holloman AFB — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Holloman AFB — the short answer
Holloman AFB, New Mexico: USDA zone 8a, about 231 days between hard freezes, across 8K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~231
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 8K 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 8a is Holloman AFB's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Holloman AFB's 231-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Holloman AFB
Each reading below is measured for Holloman AFB itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHolloman AFB runs about 231 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
MeasuredHolloman AFB sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a.
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 Holloman AFB is in
Holloman AFB sits in the Chihuahuan Deserts — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Holloman AFB's own centroid rather than borrowed from Otero County.
What Grows in Holloman AFB
Every plant below cleared Holloman AFB's own zone 8a and its 231-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Holloman AFB?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 22 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Holloman AFB
Survey cells within 31 miles of Holloman AFB checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 604 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Holloman AFB
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Holloman AFB. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASESuperfund · 0.8 mi
- HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASEToxics Release Inventory · 0.8 mi
- HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASEBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- SOARING HEIGHTS COMMUNITIES, LLCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASEPFAS · 1.4 mi
- HOLLOMAN FINAUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- 16S.09E.32Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- 16S.08E.13.4Nitrate · 5.4 mi
- WHITE SANDS NATIONAL MONUMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.6 mi
- BEKINS STORAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- 18S.08E.05.3244Nitrate · 5.7 mi
- ALAMOGORDO (CITY 0F)-WASTEWATER TREATMENT PLANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Holloman AFB'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 Holloman AFB.
Total Sites
254
within ~10 miles of Holloman AFB
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Holloman AFB
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Holloman AFB
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Holloman AFB, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Holloman AFB — Nitrate (114 sites) and Superfund (4 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Holloman AFB
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 Holloman AFB average
Your land is one point inside Holloman AFB
Everything above resolves to Holloman AFB as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 8K 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 Holloman AFB Average
Holloman AFB Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Holloman AFB
- ●One soil character for all of Holloman AFB
- ●Frost dates read at Holloman AFB's scale: Mar 22 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Holloman AFB's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Holloman AFB
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Holloman AFB, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Holloman AFB averages can't show:
We read public map data around Holloman AFB — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Holloman AFB average
How we know this about Holloman AFB
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 Holloman AFB’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 Holloman AFB
When does frost risk typically end in Holloman AFB?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Holloman AFB typically lands around Mar 22, 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 12.
When is the first frost in Holloman AFB?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Holloman AFB typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 231 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Holloman AFB?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Holloman AFB sees about 231 frost-free days — roughly Mar 22 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 12 to Oct 25, about 196 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Holloman AFB?
The federal record around Holloman AFB is a meaningful one — 254 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (114), the nearest Superfund record about 0.8 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Holloman AFB?
From about Oct 9 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 8 (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 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Holloman AFB's scale — its 8a band and its 231-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Holloman AFB'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 Holloman AFB’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Holloman AFB's own scale — its own ~231-day season between 28°F freezes, the 8,034 acres it covers and 254 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Holloman AFB's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Holloman AFB's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 22 and Nov 8 and the ~231-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 254 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Holloman AFB, the closest Superfund record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Holloman AFB's boundary and the 8,034 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~231-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Holloman AFB's own centroid, the Chihuahuan DesertsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Holloman AFB 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 Holloman AFB's 8,034 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Otero County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Otero 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 Otero County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Holloman AFB's 8,034 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Holloman AFB you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 8,034 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund record about 0.8 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 Holloman AFB-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Mexico
Wider growing context
What grows across New MexicoHolloman AFB sits outside our named growing regions, so New Mexico as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides