Sunshine, New Mexico, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
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 Sunshine, 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 Sunshine 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 Sunshine — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Sunshine — the short answer
Sunshine, New Mexico: USDA zone 8a, about 240 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~240
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 11K 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 Sunshine's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Sunshine's 240-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Sunshine
Each reading below is measured for Sunshine itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSunshine runs about 240 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
MeasuredSunshine 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 Sunshine is in
Sunshine sits in the Chihuahuan Deserts — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. That is read at Sunshine's own centroid rather than borrowed from Luna County.
What Grows in Sunshine
Every plant below cleared Sunshine's own zone 8a and its 240-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Mexico profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Sunshine?
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 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 12 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Sunshine
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Sunshine. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Copper Ridge MillMining · 1.1 mi
- US AIR FORCE AEROSTAT SITE (TARS)Brownfields · 3.2 mi
- 25S.08W.18.111 DUPNitrate · 3.9 mi
- 25S.08W.18.111ANitrate · 3.9 mi
- DEMING MUNICIPAL WATER SYSTEMPFAS · 4.3 mi
- A AND A SALVAGE RECYCLINGBrownfields · 4.9 mi
- 26S.09W.02.221Nitrate · 5.1 mi
- 24S.09W.15.433Nitrate · 5.6 mi
- CORNER STORE NO 1286Underground Storage Tanks · 6.7 mi
- 24S.09W.13.111Nitrate · 6.8 mi
- 24S.08W.20.300Nitrate · 6.9 mi
- 24S.08W.20.411Nitrate · 7.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Sunshine'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 Sunshine.
Total Sites
148
within ~10 miles of Sunshine
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Sunshine
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Sunshine
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Sunshine, Mining runs higher than the national average — 11 sites within ~10 miles of Sunshine. 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 Sunshine
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 Sunshine average
Your land is one point inside Sunshine
Everything above resolves to Sunshine as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 11K 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 Sunshine Average
Sunshine Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Sunshine
- ●One soil character for all of Sunshine
- ●Frost dates read at Sunshine's scale: Mar 17 to Nov 12
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Sunshine's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Sunshine
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Sunshine, New Mexico — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Sunshine averages can't show:
We read public map data around Sunshine — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Sunshine average
How we know this about Sunshine
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 Sunshine’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 Sunshine
When does frost risk typically end in Sunshine?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Sunshine typically lands around Mar 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 Apr 7.
When is the first frost in Sunshine?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Sunshine typically arrives around Nov 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 29, so the watching starts about Oct 13 — about 240 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Sunshine?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Sunshine sees about 240 frost-free days — roughly Mar 17 through Nov 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 7 to Oct 29, about 205 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Sunshine?
The federal record around Sunshine shows 148 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (87), the nearest Mining record about 1.1 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Sunshine?
From about Oct 13 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 12 (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 12. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Sunshine's scale — its 8a band and its 240-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Sunshine'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 Sunshine’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Sunshine's own scale — its own ~240-day season between 28°F freezes, the 11,286 acres it covers and 148 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Sunshine's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Sunshine's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 17 and Nov 12 and the ~240-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 148 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Sunshine, the closest Mining record about 1.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Sunshine's boundary and the 11,286 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~240-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Sunshine's own centroid, the Chihuahuan DesertsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Sunshine's 11,286 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Luna County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Luna 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 Luna County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Sunshine's 11,286 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Sunshine you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 11,286 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Mining record about 1.1 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 Sunshine-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Mexico
Wider growing context
What grows across New MexicoSunshine sits outside our named growing regions, so New Mexico as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides