Kalama, Washington, 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.
These conditions suit cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Kalama, 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 Kalama 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 Kalama — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Kalama — the short answer
Kalama, Washington: USDA zone 8b, about 251 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 13
- Cowlitz County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- Cowlitz County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~251
- Cowlitz County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 2K 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 Cowlitz County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Kalama's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Kalama's 251-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Kalama
Each reading below is measured for Kalama itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsKalama runs about 251 days between hard freezes (read from Cowlitz County, the closest normal to Kalama) — 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
MeasuredKalama 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 Kalama is in
Kalama sits in the Puget Lowland — EPA Level III, inside the wider Marine West Coast Forest. That is read at Kalama's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Cowlitz County is mostly Cascades. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Kalama
Every plant below cleared Kalama's own zone 8b and its 251-day season. Each card opens that plant's Washington profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Kalama?
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 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — 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 Kalama
Survey cells within 31 miles of Kalama 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.
What's on the federal record near Kalama
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Kalama. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KALAMA AUTO SUPPLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- RSG FOREST PRODUCTS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- KALAMA TELEPHONE COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- GOOD DAY MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- CHEVRON 98042Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- VANCOUVER OIL COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- KALAMA CHEVRONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HARVEST STATES COOPERATIVEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- KALAMA CHEMICAL INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- COLUMBIA FIBREUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- KALAMA SCHOOL DISTRICT 402Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- NORTH STAR YACHTS SITEToxics Release Inventory · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Kalama'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 Kalama.
Total Sites
425
within ~10 miles of Kalama
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Kalama
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Kalama
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Kalama, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Kalama — Toxics Release Inventory (31 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (300 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Kalama
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 Kalama average
Your land is one point inside Kalama
Everything above resolves to Kalama as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 2K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Cowlitz 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 Kalama Average
Kalama Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Kalama
- ●One soil character for all of Kalama
- ●Frost dates read at Kalama's scale: Mar 13 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Kalama's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Kalama
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Kalama, Washington — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Kalama averages can't show:
We read public map data around Kalama — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Kalama average
How we know this about Kalama
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 Cowlitz 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 Kalama
When does frost risk typically end in Kalama?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Kalama typically lands around Mar 13, 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 3.
When is the first frost in Kalama?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Kalama typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 251 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Kalama?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Kalama sees about 251 frost-free days — roughly Mar 13 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 3 to Nov 5, about 216 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Kalama?
The federal record around Kalama is a meaningful one — 425 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (300), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Kalama?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Kalama's scale — its 8b band and its 251-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Kalama'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 Kalama’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Kalama's own scale — the 2,305 acres it covers and 425 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Kalama's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 425 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Kalama, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Kalama's boundary and the 2,305 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~251-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Kalama sits in the Puget Lowland — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Kalama checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Kalama has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Cowlitz County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Kalama's 2,305 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Cowlitz County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Cowlitz 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 Cowlitz County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Kalama's 2,305 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Kalama you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,305 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Kalama-wide figureread your own land →