Regional guide · hardiness Zone 4

Cold and reliable: real winters, a full four-month season.

Zone 4 runs through Calgary and Winnipeg, Thunder Bay and Sudbury, Québec City and the Saguenay, and across Minnesota, the Dakotas and the northern Rockies. Snow cover is usually dependable, which protects perennials, and summers are warm enough for a complete vegetable garden including tomatoes, corn and squash from transplants.

Winter low

−34 to −29°C

−30 to −20°F

Frost-free days

110–140

Typical frost window

Roughly mid-May to late September.

Regions in Zone 4

Open any region for this week's live local guide — forecast, soil, moon, waters and an AI field note.

Gardening in Zone 4

A satisfying zone: nearly everything grows if you respect the frost dates. Start warm-season crops indoors, pick mid-season rather than late varieties, and rely on snow and mulch to carry perennials through.

Vegetables that thrive

  • Tomatoes (early and mid-season)
  • Peppers from strong transplants
  • Sweet corn (early hybrids)
  • Winter squash and pumpkins
  • Beans, peas and cucumbers
  • Garlic (fall-planted)
  • All the brassicas and root crops
  • Melons under plastic mulch in warm sites

Fruit

  • Apples (‘Honeycrisp’, ‘Haralson’, ‘Zestar!’)
  • Plums (hybrid and hardy European types)
  • Sour cherries
  • Haskap and saskatoon
  • Raspberries and blackberries (hardy types)
  • Grapes (‘Valiant’, ‘Frontenac’, ‘Marquette’)
  • Strawberries
  • Blueberries in acidic soil

Reliable perennials & shrubs

  • Peony, iris and daylily
  • Hosta and astilbe
  • Coneflower and rudbeckia
  • Hydrangea paniculata
  • Lilac, ninebark and dogwood
  • Hardy roses

Zone tips

  • Last frost is usually the third week of May but a late-May frost happens most years — keep covers ready until June.
  • Plant garlic in early October and mulch after the ground freezes.
  • Snow is your friend; avoid clearing it off beds and shrubs.
  • Choose apples on hardy rootstock and protect trunks from rabbits and sunscald.

Fishing in Zone 4

Walleye, pike, lake trout and smallmouth bass in the Shield and prairie lakes; brook trout in the cold streams; trout and grayling in the Rockies. Winter ice fishing is as popular as summer.

Signature species

  • Walleye
  • Northern pike
  • Smallmouth bass
  • Lake trout
  • Brook trout
  • Yellow perch and crappie
  • Muskellunge (Ontario, Minnesota)
  • Rainbow and cutthroat trout (foothills)

Seasons, limits and licences vary by province and state; every local guide links to the right regulator.

Foraging in Zone 4

Classic northern foraging: a good spring for fiddleheads and morels, wild berries all summer, and a serious mushroom and nut season in fall.

What to look for

  • Fiddleheads (ostrich fern)
  • Morels (May)
  • Wild leeks/ramps (eastern part of the zone)
  • Wild strawberries, raspberries and blueberries
  • Chanterelles, boletes and lobster mushrooms
  • Hazelnuts
  • Highbush cranberries
  • Wild plums and chokecherries

Never eat anything you cannot identify with certainty. Confirm with a regional field guide or local expert.

The Zone 4 year

  1. March

    Start onions, peppers and tomatoes indoors; last-ice perch and lake trout.

  2. April–May

    Peas, spinach and potatoes in April/early May; fiddleheads and morels; opening-day trout and post-spawn walleye.

  3. June

    Tender crops in after the last frost; smallmouth on beds; wild strawberries.

  4. July–August

    Peak harvest; raspberries and blueberries; fish early and late.

  5. September

    First frost late in the month; harvest squash; mushrooms and hazelnuts; fall walleye.

  6. October–February

    Garlic and bulbs in; ice fishing from December; prune trees in February–March.

Get the weekly note for your Zone 4 garden

What to plant, what's biting and what's ripening — one email a week, tuned to your area.