Keizer, Oregon, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Keizer, 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 Keizer 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 Keizer — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Keizer — the short answer
Keizer, Oregon: USDA zone 8b, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 23
- Marion County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- Marion County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- Marion County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 5K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Marion County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Keizer's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Keizer's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Keizer
Each reading below is measured for Keizer itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsKeizer runs about 243 days between hard freezes (read from Marion County, the closest normal to Keizer) — 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
MeasuredKeizer sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Keizer is in
Keizer sits in the Willamette Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Marine West Coast Forest. That is read at Keizer's own centroid rather than borrowed from Marion County.
What Grows in Keizer
Every plant below cleared Keizer's own zone 8b and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's Oregon profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Keizer?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 23 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 21 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Keizer
Survey cells within 31 miles of Keizer checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 503 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Keizer
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Keizer. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KADELS AUTO BODY LLC KEIZERBrownfields · 600 ft
- NORTH SALEM-CITY OF KEIZER AREAWIDE GROUNDWATERSuperfund · 950 ft
- MERRITT #1, INC. KEIZERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- KEIZER, CITY OF - WATER DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- KEIZER RFPDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- WALGREENS #4230Brownfields · 2300 ft
- QWEST CORPORATION dba CENTURYLINK QC (ROUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- SAFEWAY STORE 1516Brownfields · 2400 ft
- UNOCAL 3628Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- TRUAX CORPORATION #38Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- MCNARY GOLF COURSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Q-LUBE #1098Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Keizer'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 Keizer.
Total Sites
825
within ~10 miles of Keizer
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
15 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Keizer
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Keizer
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Keizer, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Keizer — Superfund (15 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (520 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Keizer
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 Keizer average
Your land is one point inside Keizer
Everything above resolves to Keizer as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 5K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Marion County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’s own centroid. 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 city 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 Keizer Average
Keizer Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Keizer
- ●One soil character for all of Keizer
- ●Frost dates read at Keizer's scale: Mar 23 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Keizer's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Keizer
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Keizer, Oregon — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Keizer averages can't show:
We read public map data around Keizer — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Keizer average
How we know this about Keizer
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Marion County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Keizer
When does frost risk typically end in Keizer?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Keizer typically lands around Mar 23, 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 13.
When is the first frost in Keizer?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Keizer typically arrives around Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 7, so the watching starts about Oct 22 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Keizer?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Keizer sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 23 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 13 to Nov 7, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Keizer?
The federal record around Keizer is a meaningful one — 825 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (520), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.1 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 Keizer?
From about Oct 22 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 21 (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 21. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Keizer's scale — its 8b band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Keizer'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 Keizer’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Keizer's own scale — the 4,598 acres it covers and 825 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Keizer's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 825 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Keizer, the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Keizer's boundary and the 4,598 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Keizer's own centroid, the Willamette ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Keizer checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Keizer has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Marion County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Keizer's 4,598 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Marion County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Marion County
- The growing challenges every Oregon grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Oregon
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Marion County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Keizer's 4,598 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Keizer you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 4,598 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 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 Keizer-wide figureread your own land →