Rodeo, 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 Rodeo, 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 Rodeo 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 Rodeo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Rodeo — the short answer
Rodeo, New Mexico: USDA zone 8a, about 249 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~249
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 5K 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 Rodeo's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Rodeo's 249-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Rodeo
Each reading below is measured for Rodeo itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRodeo runs about 249 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
MeasuredRodeo 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 Rodeo is in
Rodeo sits in the Madrean Archipelago — EPA Level III, inside the wider Southern Semi-arid Highlands. That is read at Rodeo's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Hidalgo County is mostly Chihuahuan Deserts. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Rodeo
Every plant below cleared Rodeo's own zone 8a and its 249-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Rodeo?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Rodeo
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Rodeo. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 28S.21W.30.332ANitrate · 850 ft
- MARTINS GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- RODEO GROCERY AND SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- D-18-32 11BCCNitrate · 2.8 mi
- D-18-32 33CAANitrate · 3.6 mi
- Grace MineMining · 5.6 mi
- Homestake MineMining · 8.3 mi
- D-17-31 25AANitrate · 8.3 mi
- PORTAL STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 8.4 mi
- Savage MineMining · 8.8 mi
- USDA FS - CORONADO NF - PORTAL RANGER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.0 mi
- Texas Mine GroupMining · 9.5 mi
Measured from Rodeo'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 Rodeo.
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Rodeo
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Mine waste leaches heavy metals. Test for lead, arsenic and cadmium before growing food here.
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
Check your specific parcel in Rodeo
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 Rodeo average
Your land is one point inside Rodeo
Everything above resolves to Rodeo as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 5K 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 Rodeo Average
Rodeo Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Rodeo
- ●One soil character for all of Rodeo
- ●Frost dates read at Rodeo's scale: Mar 11 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Rodeo's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Rodeo
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Rodeo, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Rodeo averages can't show:
We read public map data around Rodeo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Rodeo average
How we know this about Rodeo
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 Rodeo’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 Rodeo
When does frost risk typically end in Rodeo?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Rodeo typically lands around Mar 11, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Rodeo?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Rodeo typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 249 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Rodeo?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Rodeo sees about 249 frost-free days — roughly Mar 11 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 1 to Nov 1, about 214 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Rodeo?
The federal record around Rodeo is a meaningful one — 19 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (8), the nearest Nitrate 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 Rodeo?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Rodeo's scale — its 8a band and its 249-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Rodeo'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 Rodeo’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Rodeo's own scale — its own ~249-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,244 acres it covers and 19 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Rodeo's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Rodeo's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 11 and Nov 15 and the ~249-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 19 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Rodeo, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Rodeo's boundary and the 5,244 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~249-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Rodeo sits in the Madrean Archipelago — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Rodeo's 5,244 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hidalgo County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hidalgo 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 Hidalgo County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Rodeo's 5,244 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Rodeo you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,244 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 Rodeo-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Mexico
Wider growing context
What grows across New MexicoRodeo sits outside our named growing regions, so New Mexico as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides