Brian Head, Utah, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include pumpkin, blackberry, california poppy, and zucchini — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Brian Head, 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 Brian Head 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 Brian Head — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Brian Head — the short answer
Brian Head, Utah: USDA zone 6a, about 106 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jun 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Sep 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~106
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 6a is Brian Head's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Brian Head's 106-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Brian Head
Each reading below is measured for Brian Head itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBrian Head runs about 106 days between hard freezes — a short growing season.
Long-maturing crops like melons, sweet potatoes, and winter squash can run out of runway before the first hard freeze, ripening late or not at all.
Lead with fast-maturing varieties, and stretch the season on both ends with cold frames, low tunnels, or a greenhouse.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBrian Head sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Brian Head is in
Brian Head sits in the Wasatch and Uinta Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northwestern Forested Mountains. That is read at Brian Head's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Iron County is mostly Central Basin and Range. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Brian Head
Every plant below cleared Brian Head's own zone 6a and its 106-day season. Each card opens that plant's Utah profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Brian Head?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around May 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jun 5 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Sep 19 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even here the calendar’s edges hold value: thirty-day greens late in the window, then garlic and a rested bed for spring.
What's on the federal record near Brian Head
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Brian Head. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BRIAN HEAD TOWNUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- CHALET VILLAGE CONDOMINIUMSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- BRIAN HEAD GAS STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- CEDAR BREAKS NATIONAL MONUMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.0 mi
- FAA-CEDAR CITY UT CDC ARSRUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.3 mi
- UDOT STA. #540 CEDAR BREAKSUnderground Storage Tanks · 8.5 mi
- DEER TRAIL LODGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.2 mi
- SUNSHINE TRUCKSTOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.4 mi
- RUSTIC LODGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.5 mi
- IRON COUNTY ROAD SHEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.6 mi
- PAROWAN TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 9.7 mi
- MAVERIK #231Underground Storage Tanks · 9.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Brian Head'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 Brian Head.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Brian Head
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Brian Head
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
Check your specific parcel in Brian Head
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 Brian Head average
Your land is one point inside Brian Head
Everything above resolves to Brian Head as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Brian Head Average
Brian Head Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Brian Head
- ●One soil character for all of Brian Head
- ●Frost dates read at Brian Head's scale: Jun 5 to Sep 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Brian Head's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Brian Head
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Brian Head, Utah — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Brian Head averages can't show:
We read public map data around Brian Head — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Brian Head average
How we know this about Brian Head
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 Brian Head’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 Brian Head
When does frost risk typically end in Brian Head?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Brian Head typically lands around Jun 5, 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 Jun 26.
When is the first frost in Brian Head?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Brian Head typically arrives around Sep 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Sep 5, so the watching starts about Aug 20 — about 106 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Brian Head?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Brian Head sees about 106 frost-free days — roughly Jun 5 through Sep 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Jun 26 to Sep 5, about 71 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Brian Head?
The federal record around Brian Head is light — 19 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (16), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
How do gardeners stretch the season in Brian Head?
With about 106 frost-free days between hard freezes, Brian Head rewards the classic extension moves: floating row cover buys roughly two to four extra weeks at each shoulder — on this season that is a working window nearer 134 to 162 days — and cold frames or low tunnels buy more. Starting transplants indoors ahead of the Jun 5 hard-freeze normal stretches the season without touching the calendar.
Everything above is measured at Brian Head's scale — its 6a band and its 106-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Brian Head'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 Brian Head’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Brian Head's own scale — its own ~106-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,336 acres it covers and 19 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Brian Head's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Brian Head's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Jun 5 and Sep 19 and the ~106-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 19 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Brian Head, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Brian Head's boundary and the 2,336 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~106-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Brian Head sits in the Wasatch and Uinta Mountains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Brian Head's 2,336 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Iron County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Iron County
- The growing challenges every Utah grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Utah
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Iron County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Brian Head's 2,336 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Brian Head you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,336 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Brian Head-wide figureread your own land →
More in Utah
Wider growing context
What grows across UtahBrian Head sits outside our named growing regions, so Utah as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides