Orogrande, New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Orogrande, 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 Orogrande 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 Orogrande — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Orogrande — the short answer
Orogrande, New Mexico: USDA zone 8a, about 256 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~256
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 4K 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 Orogrande's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Orogrande's 256-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Orogrande
Each reading below is measured for Orogrande itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredOrogrande runs about 256 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
MeasuredOrogrande 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 Orogrande is in
Orogrande sits in the Chihuahuan Deserts — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Orogrande's own centroid rather than borrowed from Otero County.
What Grows in Orogrande
Every plant below cleared Orogrande's own zone 8a and its 256-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Orogrande?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 18 — 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 Orogrande
Survey cells within 31 miles of Orogrande checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 632 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Orogrande
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Orogrande. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Copper King GroupMining · 1100 ft
- Alice MineMining · 1300 ft
- Copper HillMining · 2100 ft
- Three Bears MineMining · 2500 ft
- Mont AltoMining · 0.9 mi
- Mid-Day Zinc DepositMining · 0.9 mi
- BLM-OROGRANDE LANDFILLSuperfund · 1.1 mi
- Nannie Baird MineMining · 1.2 mi
- Nannie Baird GroupMining · 1.2 mi
- Garnet LodeMining · 1.2 mi
- ORO GRANDE RANGE CAMP CUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- ORO GRANDE RANGE CAMP AUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Orogrande'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 Orogrande.
Total Sites
29
within ~10 miles of Orogrande
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Orogrande
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Orogrande, Mining runs higher than the national average — 21 sites within ~10 miles of Orogrande. 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 Orogrande
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 Orogrande average
Your land is one point inside Orogrande
Everything above resolves to Orogrande as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 Orogrande Average
Orogrande Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Orogrande
- ●One soil character for all of Orogrande
- ●Frost dates read at Orogrande's scale: Mar 7 to Nov 18
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Orogrande's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Orogrande
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Orogrande, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Orogrande averages can't show:
We read public map data around Orogrande — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Orogrande average
How we know this about Orogrande
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 Orogrande’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 Orogrande
When does frost risk typically end in Orogrande?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Orogrande typically lands around Mar 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 Mar 28.
When is the first frost in Orogrande?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Orogrande typically arrives around Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 4, so the watching starts about Oct 19 — about 256 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Orogrande?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Orogrande sees about 256 frost-free days — roughly Mar 7 through Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 28 to Nov 4, about 221 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Orogrande?
The federal record around Orogrande is a meaningful one — 29 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (21), the nearest Mining record about 0.2 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 Orogrande?
From about Oct 19 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 18 (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 18. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Orogrande's scale — its 8a band and its 256-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Orogrande'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 Orogrande’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Orogrande's own scale — its own ~256-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,635 acres it covers and 29 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Orogrande's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Orogrande's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 7 and Nov 18 and the ~256-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 29 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Orogrande, the closest Mining record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Orogrande's boundary and the 3,635 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~256-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Orogrande's own centroid, the Chihuahuan DesertsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Orogrande 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 Orogrande's 3,635 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 Orogrande's 3,635 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Orogrande you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,635 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Mining 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 Orogrande-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Mexico
Wider growing context
What grows across New MexicoOrogrande sits outside our named growing regions, so New Mexico as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides