Lake McMurray, Washington, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — 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, fig, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Lake McMurray, 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 Lake McMurray 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 Lake McMurray — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lake McMurray — the short answer
Lake McMurray, Washington: USDA zone 8b, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 884 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 884 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 8b is Lake McMurray's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lake McMurray's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lake McMurray
Each reading below is measured for Lake McMurray itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLake McMurray runs about 232 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
MeasuredLake McMurray 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 Lake McMurray is in
Lake McMurray sits in the Puget Lowland — EPA Level III, inside the wider Marine West Coast Forest. That is read at Lake McMurray's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Skagit County is mostly North Cascades. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Lake McMurray
Every plant below cleared Lake McMurray's own zone 8b and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's Washington profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lake McMurray?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. 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 Nov 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Lake McMurray
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lake McMurray. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 32N/04E-03A01Nitrate · 2.4 mi
- WEEDA FARMCAFO · 2.5 mi
- 32N/04E-02P01Nitrate · 2.7 mi
- SAIMONS CONSTRUCTION INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- 32N/05E-07N01Nitrate · 3.4 mi
- 33N/04E-33D01Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- 32N/04E-04K01Nitrate · 3.7 mi
- 32N/05E-08N01Nitrate · 3.8 mi
- CONWAY CENTRAL OFFICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- INTERSTATE 5 GAS & FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- 32N/04E-10Q04Nitrate · 4.0 mi
- FREEBORN FIRE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lake McMurray'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 Lake McMurray.
Total Sites
368
within ~10 miles of Lake McMurray
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lake McMurray
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lake McMurray
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lake McMurray, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Lake McMurray — CAFO (11 sites) and Nitrate (118 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Lake McMurray
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 Lake McMurray average
Your land is one point inside Lake McMurray
Everything above resolves to Lake McMurray as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 884 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 Lake McMurray Average
Lake McMurray Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Lake McMurray
- ●One soil character for all of Lake McMurray
- ●Frost dates read at Lake McMurray's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lake McMurray's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lake McMurray
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lake McMurray, Washington — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lake McMurray averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lake McMurray — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lake McMurray average
How we know this about Lake McMurray
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 Lake McMurray’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 Lake McMurray
When does frost risk typically end in Lake McMurray?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lake McMurray 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 Lake McMurray?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lake McMurray typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lake McMurray?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lake McMurray sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Nov 1, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lake McMurray?
The federal record around Lake McMurray is a meaningful one — 368 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (192), the nearest Nitrate record about 2.4 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 Lake McMurray?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lake McMurray's scale — its 8b band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lake McMurray'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 Lake McMurray’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Lake McMurray's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 884 acres it covers and 368 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lake McMurray's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lake McMurray's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 28 and Nov 15 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 368 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lake McMurray, the closest Nitrate record about 2.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lake McMurray's boundary and the 884 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Lake McMurray sits in the Puget Lowland — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lake McMurray's 884 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Skagit County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Skagit 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 Skagit County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lake McMurray's 884 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lake McMurray you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 884 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 2.4 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 Lake McMurray-wide figureread your own land →
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