Amboy, Washington, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Amboy, 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 Amboy 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 Amboy — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Amboy — the short answer
Amboy, Washington: USDA zone 8a, about 217 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 28
- Clark County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 31
- Clark County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~217
- Clark County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 6K 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 Clark County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8a is Amboy's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Amboy's 217-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Amboy
Each reading below is measured for Amboy itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsAmboy runs about 217 days between hard freezes (read from Clark County, the closest normal to Amboy) — 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
MeasuredAmboy 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 Amboy is in
Amboy sits in the Cascades — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northwestern Forested Mountains. That is read at Amboy's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Clark County is mostly Willamette Valley. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Amboy
Every plant below cleared Amboy's own zone 8a and its 217-day season. Each card opens that plant's Washington profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Amboy?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 28 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 31 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Amboy
Survey cells within 31 miles of Amboy checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 565 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Amboy
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Amboy. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AROUND THE CLOCK FUELUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- WA DOT FARGHER LAKE MAINTENANCE SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- FARGHER LAKE GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- CHROMWELL TRUST PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- WILSON PARTS & SERVICE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- GREEN MOUNTAIN SCHOOL DIST 103Underground Storage Tanks · 2.9 mi
- AMBOY INTERMEDIATE SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Cole's MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.8 mi
- MERWIN HYDROELECTRIC PRJBrownfields · 4.3 mi
- MERWIN HYDROELECTRIC PRJ.Underground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- NORM LANGE ROAD BUILDERUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- YACOLT PRIMARY SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Amboy'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 Amboy.
Total Sites
87
within ~10 miles of Amboy
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 mining site (prospects, none worked)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Amboy
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Amboy
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Amboy, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 60 sites within ~10 miles of Amboy. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Amboy
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 Amboy average
Your land is one point inside Amboy
Everything above resolves to Amboy as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 6K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Clark County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’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 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 Amboy Average
Amboy Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Amboy
- ●One soil character for all of Amboy
- ●Frost dates read at Amboy's scale: Mar 28 to Oct 31
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Amboy's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Amboy
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Amboy, Washington — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Amboy averages can't show:
We read public map data around Amboy — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Amboy average
How we know this about Amboy
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 Clark 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 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 Amboy
When does frost risk typically end in Amboy?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Amboy typically lands around Mar 28, 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 18.
When is the first frost in Amboy?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Amboy typically arrives around Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 17, so the watching starts about Oct 1 — about 217 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Amboy?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Amboy sees about 217 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Oct 17, about 182 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Amboy?
The federal record around Amboy shows 87 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (60), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.8 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 Amboy?
From about Oct 1 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 Oct 31 (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 Oct 31. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Amboy's scale — its 8a band and its 217-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Amboy'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 Amboy’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Amboy's own scale — the 6,388 acres it covers and 87 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Amboy's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 87 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Amboy, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Amboy's boundary and the 6,388 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~217-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Amboy sits in the Cascades — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Amboy checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Amboy has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Clark County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Amboy's 6,388 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Clark County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Clark County
- The growing challenges every Washington grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Washington
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Clark County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Amboy's 6,388 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Amboy you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,388 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.8 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 Amboy-wide figureread your own land →