Forcing Spring Bulbs Indoors in Nevada
Forcing spring bulbs indoors works throughout Nevada, and around Las Vegas it’s often the only way to get tulips, hyacinths, or crocus to bloom at all.
Gardening in Nevada
Everything we have worked out for Nevada: what to plant and when, which varieties finish in time, the pests that actually turn up here, and the jobs that pay off month by month. We also cover the rest of the property, from lawns and soil to home care and energy, because a garden rarely stops at the vegetable bed.
The numbers first, because everything else follows from them. Measured at the weather station in Las Vegas, the last spring freeze runs January 7 to February 1 and the first fall freeze runs December 8 to December 23, USDA zones 4a-10a, 6,694 growing degree days in the year.
Heat, not frost, is what shortens the season here: above 86 °F tomato pollen goes sterile, so growers run a spring crop and an autumn one rather than a single long season. Garlic does well: 8.7 weeks below 40 °F, comfortably past the six it needs to form a proper head.
Elsewhere on the property in Nevada: the pests that turn up here.
Figures from NOAA's 1991-2020 climate normals. A state is not one climate: elevation, a large lake or the coast can move these dates by two weeks either way, so check your own county with the extension service before you spend money.
Growing Spring Bulbs in Containers in Nevada
Forcing is the answer for most of Nevada’s low-elevation gardens, where winter doesn’t hold the twelve to fourteen weeks of sustained cold a tulip or…
Canning at Altitude in Nevada: What Your Elevation Changes
Las Vegas sits at 2,001 feet, where water boils between 204 and 208 degrees Fahrenheit instead of the 212 you’d get at sea level.
When to Plant Onions in Nevada
In the low desert around Las Vegas, onions go in the ground in autumn, not spring.
The Best Onion Varieties for Nevada
Nevada’s reference station sits at 36.07 degrees north, in Las Vegas, where the longest day of the year delivers 14 hours and 27 minutes of daylight.
The Nevada Lawn Care Calendar, Month by Month
A month-by-month Nevada lawn calendar covering warm-season mowing, feeding and frost timing, and where the state’s elevation changes everything.
The Best Grass Seed for Nevada Lawns
See which warm-season grasses suit Nevada’s low desert, why cool-season seed fails there, and how elevation changes the picture across the state.
The Nevada Apple Calendar, Stage by Stage
A stage-by-stage guide to reading apple bud development in Nevada, from Las Vegas’s mild valley floor to the colder high-desert basins around Reno and Carson City.
Watering a Garden in Nevada: How Much, How Often, and the Local Rules
Nevada gardeners water more, and more carefully, than almost anyone else in the country.
Nevada Soil: What You Are Digging Into, and How to Improve It
Nevada’s official state soil is the Orovada series, a dry-climate Aridisol that runs alkaline, sandy, and low in organic matter.