La Tierra, New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Expect cabbage, pawpaw, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in La Tierra, 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 La Tierra 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 La Tierra — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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La Tierra — the short answer
La Tierra, New Mexico: USDA zone 7a, about 192 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~192
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 6K 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 7a is La Tierra's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against La Tierra's 192-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in La Tierra
Each reading below is measured for La Tierra itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLa Tierra runs about 192 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
MeasuredLa Tierra sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 La Tierra is in
La Tierra sits in the Arizona/New Mexico Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at La Tierra's own centroid rather than borrowed from Santa Fe County.
What Grows in La Tierra
Every plant below cleared La Tierra's own zone 7a and its 192-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in La Tierra?
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 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
Documented around La Tierra
Survey cells within 31 miles of La Tierra checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 437 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near La Tierra
Closest first, within ~10 miles of La Tierra. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 18N.08E.24.3144Nitrate · 2.1 mi
- SANTA FE AVIATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- 18N.08E.13.224Nitrate · 3.4 mi
- 18N.08E.33.14312 WINDMILLNitrate · 4.0 mi
- 17N.08E.02.411Nitrate · 4.0 mi
- BUCKMAN REGIONAL WATER TREATMENT PLANTBrownfields · 4.4 mi
- 17N.09E.21.4222Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- 18N.09E.10.320Nitrate · 4.9 mi
- 17N.09E.21.4432Nitrate · 5.0 mi
- 17N.09E.30.422Nitrate · 5.0 mi
- Seed Bank WellNitrate · 5.1 mi
- 18N.09E.23.22211Nitrate · 5.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from La Tierra'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 La Tierra.
Total Sites
609
within ~10 miles of La Tierra
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
5 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of La Tierra
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of La Tierra
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in La Tierra
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 La Tierra average
Your land is one point inside La Tierra
Everything above resolves to La Tierra as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 6K 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 La Tierra Average
La Tierra Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across La Tierra
- ●One soil character for all of La Tierra
- ●Frost dates read at La Tierra's scale: Apr 17 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not La Tierra's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in La Tierra
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in La Tierra, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that La Tierra averages can't show:
We read public map data around La Tierra — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the La Tierra average
How we know this about La Tierra
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 La Tierra’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 La Tierra
When does frost risk typically end in La Tierra?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in La Tierra typically lands around Apr 17, 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 8.
When is the first frost in La Tierra?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in La Tierra typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 192 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in La Tierra?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, La Tierra sees about 192 frost-free days — roughly Apr 17 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 8 to Oct 12, about 157 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in La Tierra?
The federal record around La Tierra is a meaningful one — 609 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (227), the nearest Nitrate record about 2.1 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 La Tierra?
From about Sep 26 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at La Tierra's scale — its 7a band and its 192-day season. Your yard writes its own version of La Tierra'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 La Tierra’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at La Tierra's own scale — its own ~192-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,278 acres it covers and 609 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- La Tierra's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- La Tierra's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 17 and Oct 26 and the ~192-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 609 documented contamination sites on the federal record near La Tierra, the closest Nitrate record about 2.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- La Tierra's boundary and the 6,278 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~192-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at La Tierra's own centroid, the Arizona/New Mexico PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around La Tierra 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 La Tierra's 6,278 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Santa Fe County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Santa Fe 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 Santa Fe County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among La Tierra's 6,278 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of La Tierra you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,278 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 2.1 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 La Tierra-wide figureread your own land →