East Renton Highlands, Washington, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
The conditions favor cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in East Renton Highlands, 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 East Renton Highlands 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 East Renton Highlands — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
East Renton Highlands — the short answer
East Renton Highlands, Washington: USDA zone 8b, about 252 days between hard freezes, across 7K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 14
- King County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- King County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~252
- King County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 7K 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 King County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is East Renton Highlands's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against East Renton Highlands's 252-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in East Renton Highlands
Each reading below is measured for East Renton Highlands itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsEast Renton Highlands runs about 252 days between hard freezes (read from King County, the closest normal to East Renton Highlands) — 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
MeasuredEast Renton Highlands 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 East Renton Highlands is in
East Renton Highlands sits in the Puget Lowland — EPA Level III, inside the wider Marine West Coast Forest. That is read at East Renton Highlands's own centroid rather than borrowed from King County.
What Grows in East Renton Highlands
Every plant below cleared East Renton Highlands's own zone 8b and its 252-day season. Each card opens that plant's Washington profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in East Renton Highlands?
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 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 14 (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. 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 East Renton Highlands
Closest first, within ~10 miles of East Renton Highlands. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CONTAINER CORPORATION OF AMERICAUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- DOCHNAHL CONSTRUCTION INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- KING COUNTY SHOPS SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- TARGET EQUIPMENT RENTALSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- GEORGE BALES SEA-PORT DOZING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- RICHARD GRANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- CLAYTON E HAMILTONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- B AND H PAINTINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- FRIENDLY FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- GARY L MCCANN TRUCKING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- QUEEN CITY FARMS INCBrownfields · 2.1 mi
- BIOENERGY WASHINGTONBrownfields · 2.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from East Renton Highlands'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 East Renton Highlands.
Total Sites
1,450
within ~10 miles of East Renton Highlands
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
9 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of East Renton Highlands
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of East Renton Highlands
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around East Renton Highlands, PFAS runs higher than the national average — 12 sites within ~10 miles of East Renton Highlands. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in East Renton Highlands
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 East Renton Highlands average
Your land is one point inside East Renton Highlands
Everything above resolves to East Renton Highlands as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 7K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from King 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 East Renton Highlands Average
East Renton Highlands Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across East Renton Highlands
- ●One soil character for all of East Renton Highlands
- ●Frost dates read at East Renton Highlands's scale: Mar 14 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not East Renton Highlands's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in East Renton Highlands
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in East Renton Highlands, Washington — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that East Renton Highlands averages can't show:
We read public map data around East Renton Highlands — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the East Renton Highlands average
How we know this about East Renton Highlands
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 King 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 East Renton Highlands
When does frost risk typically end in East Renton Highlands?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in East Renton Highlands typically lands around Mar 14, 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 4.
When is the first frost in East Renton Highlands?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in East Renton Highlands 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 252 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in East Renton Highlands?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, East Renton Highlands sees about 252 frost-free days — roughly Mar 14 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 4 to Nov 7, about 217 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in East Renton Highlands?
The federal record around East Renton Highlands runs heavier than most — 1,450 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (871), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in East Renton Highlands?
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 East Renton Highlands's scale — its 8b band and its 252-day season. Your yard writes its own version of East Renton Highlands'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 East Renton Highlands’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at East Renton Highlands's own scale — the 7,103 acres it covers and 1,450 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- East Renton Highlands's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 1,450 documented contamination sites on the federal record near East Renton Highlands, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- East Renton Highlands's boundary and the 7,103 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~252-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at East Renton Highlands's own centroid, the Puget LowlandUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — East Renton Highlands has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom King County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so East Renton Highlands's 7,103 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom King County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom King 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 King County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among East Renton Highlands's 7,103 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of East Renton Highlands you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 7,103 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 East Renton Highlands-wide figureread your own land →
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