Skamania County, in Washington, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Skamania County lies within the Columbia Gorge and the Pacific Northwest — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Skamania County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Skamania County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Skamania County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Skamania County — the short answer
Skamania County, Washington: USDA zone 7b, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 1.1M acres.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 1.1M acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 7b is Skamania County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Skamania County's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Skamania County
Across a year, Skamania County accumulates about 1,177 growing degree days above 50°F, about 536 fewer than the middle Washington county — ahead of 7 of Washington’s 39 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Skamania County
Across Skamania County, the ground is predominantly Inceptisols, where Zygore, Aschoff, and Swift are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a gravelly loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.6–6.1, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Inceptisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
3%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Skamania County
The USDA soil survey maps 79% of Skamania County as well drained — but another 10% drains differently: 5% somewhat excessively drained, 5% moderately well drained.
Zygore is the most extensive named soil at 7% of mapped acres, then Aschoff (7%) and Swift (6%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Skamania County
Each reading below is measured for Skamania County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Skamania County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Skamania County runs about pH 5.6–6.1, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredSkamania County runs about 205 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
MeasuredSkamania County sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Skamania County is in
Skamania County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Cascades (91%) and Eastern Cascades Slopes and Foothills (8%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Skamania County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Skamania County's own USDA zone 7b and its own 205-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Washington profile.
Is it too late to plant in Skamania County?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 18; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — 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.
Documented around Skamania County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Skamania County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 572 miles off. What to watch for.
- monarch butterfly1 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Skamania County
USGS estimates 467 lb of Metolachlor-s on Skamania County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (467 lb) and Simazine (260 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Skamania County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Skamania County — 168 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Skamania County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Skamania County
Closest first, across Skamania County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SKAMANIA SCHOOL DISTRICT 002Underground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- 07N/06E-26L01Nitrate · 4.5 mi
- PINE CREEK WORK CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.5 mi
- Wind River MineMining · 5.8 mi
- STEVENSON WA LINE SEG 47 PRINT 399Underground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- BNSF RAILWAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- MAIN STREET CONVENIENCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- 04N/07E-04L01Nitrate · 11.5 mi
- PACIFICORP HYDRO RESOURCES SWIFT HYDROELBrownfields · 12.2 mi
- SWIFT HYDROELECTRIC PROJECTUnderground Storage Tanks · 12.3 mi
- 04N/07E-27L01Nitrate · 15.5 mi
- WIND RIVER RANGER DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 16.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Skamania County'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 Skamania County.
Sources Checked
across Skamania County
Severity Distribution
across Skamania County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Skamania County, Mining runs higher than the national average — 92 sites across Skamania County. 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 Skamania County
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 Skamania County average
Your land is one point inside Skamania County
Everything above resolves to Skamania County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 1.1M 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Skamania County Average
Skamania County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Skamania County
- ●One soil character for all of Skamania County
- ●Frost dates read at Skamania County's scale: Apr 15 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Skamania County's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Skamania County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Skamania County, Washington — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Skamania County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Skamania County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Skamania County average
How we know this about Skamania County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Skamania County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Skamania County
When does frost risk typically end in Skamania County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Skamania County typically lands around Apr 15, 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 May 6.
How long is the growing season in Skamania County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Skamania County sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 15 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 6 to Oct 23, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Skamania County?
The federal record around Skamania County runs heavier than most — 168 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (92), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.6 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
Everything above is measured at Skamania County's scale — its 7b band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Skamania County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Washington's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Skamania County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Skamania County's own scale — its own ~205-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 168 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Skamania County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Skamania County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Skamania CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 168 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.6 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Skamania County's boundary and the 1,061,291 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Skamania County spans, Cascades the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Skamania County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Skamania County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Washington grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Washington
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Skamania County — the ~205 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Skamania County's 1,061,291 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 168 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Skamania Countyread your own land →