Fruit Trees for Baraboo, Wisconsin Dells and Portage, Wisconsin

On January 30, 1951, NOAA's Baraboo station read −45°F, tied for the coldest reading on file at any station in or around this map. In the same cold snap Portage, 15 miles east and 28 feet lower, read −30°F. That gap isn't a fluke: in the median year Baraboo's coldest night runs 4°F colder than Portage's, and in the February 1996 cold snap it ran 11°F colder (−41°F against −30°F). Growing fruit trees for Baraboo, Wisconsin Dells and Portage starts with knowing why. The map covers south-central Wisconsin from the Baraboo Hills to the Lower Wisconsin, Reedsburg to Poynette and the Dells to Merrimac, in Sauk and Columbia counties with corners of Juneau, Adams and Marquette.

Type your address in the box on the map to get the number for your own place, and the list of what we sell that has come through it.

How to read this map

The big number is the 30-year planning low, the same number our cold hardiness calculator uses, nudged for the ground around you. It's a safe number to plan on, not the record and not a promise of how often it comes. The MFTC zone is that number in half zones. The typical winter is an average year's coldest night, the kind of number USDA's map is built on. The spring layer shows how much warmer or colder a spot runs than downtown Baraboo on a still, clear night at bloom.

Downtown Baraboo, our reference, plans for −32°F, MFTC zone 3b, with a typical winter of −17°F. The middle of the map's growing ground plans for −30°F, and half of it falls between −32°F and −29°F. The warm end, all zone 4a, is downtown Portage at −25°F, Pacific at −26°F, the hamlet of Lake Wisconsin at −27°F, Durward's Glen and Dekorra at −28°F, and the hillside at Ski-Hi Fruit Farm at −29°F. The cold end, all zone 3b, is mostly low ground north of the hills: Delton Grand and Wisconsin Dells at −34°F, and Lake Delton, Big Spring, Lyndon Station, Dellwood and (just south of Baraboo) Crawford Crossing at −33°F.

Why the map looks the way it does

The Baraboo Hills run this map: a broken ring of hard red quartzite about 25 miles long, standing about 700 feet above the country around it and marking the eastern edge of the Driftless Area. The North Range and South Range enclose the Baraboo valley. The Baraboo River comes in through the Upper Narrows near Rock Springs and leaves through the Lower Narrows toward the Wisconsin below Portage. On a clear, calm night the slopes lose their heat to the sky, the chilled air slides down the glens, and the floor makes its own cold on top of that. Cold pools above a narrows, and this bowl's only exits are gorges. On a still night it's one airshed with small drains.

NOAA station records back it up. Baraboo's station, the one running 4°F colder than Portage over 70 years, sits at the wastewater plant on the river at 813 feet, about 65 feet below downtown. Go up and it warms. A ridge station southwest of Rock Springs, at 1,260 feet, read −32°F in the February 1996 snap that took Baraboo to −41°F (it has only 10 years on file). The automated station at the Baraboo-Wisconsin Dells Airport, about 3 miles north of town at 978 feet, hasn't recorded anything colder than −23°F in 30 winters; its coldest came in 2018-19, the winter the Baraboo, Reedsburg and Dells stations went to −35°F to −37°F. The map plans for −30°F there, colder than anything that station has recorded.

That's the thermal belt, slopes where the cold keeps draining past. Within 3 miles of most towns here the benches 100 to 700 feet up plan 2°F to 4°F warmer than the floor (−30°F against −34°F around Lakewood). A Hungarian study of 69 clear, calm nights found a valley floor averaging 6.7°F colder than a slope 230 feet higher. The planning low takes fine-scale terrain at a quarter strength, since our station test couldn't prove more; the spring layer uses it at full strength. So Hickory Hills Estates, 170 feet above the floor near the Dells, plans just 1°F warmer than the floor around it but has the warmest spring reading of any named place on the map, 11°F warmer than Baraboo.

North of the hills the country flattens into the bed of glacial Lake Wisconsin, the Central Sand Plain; when the lake's ice dam failed about 14,000 years ago, the flood cut the Dells. NOAA's Dells station, at the wastewater plant at 833 feet, has the coldest 30-year number of any station on this map, runs 3°F colder than Portage over 93 years, and read −37°F in both the 1996 and 2019 cold snaps. We haven't found a published study of why. The ground fits the physics: a wide, shallow basin can pool harder than a deep valley that drains, and loose, dry sand holds less heat for the night than firm, moist soil.

Portage is the warm end, and we haven't found a published explanation for that either. It isn't height: its station, at the wastewater plant at 785 feet, is the lowest long-record station on the map, yet it has the mildest winters, the earliest median last frost and the longest season. It sits outside the ring of hills, on a marshy strip where the Fox and Wisconsin rivers come within 1.5 miles of each other. Lake Wisconsin, to the south, freezes (the Merrimac Ferry quits when the ice gets too thick), and frozen water does nothing for its shore.

The two layers measure different things. The planning low leans on 30 winters of station records, so it runs coldest where the stations have. The spring layer is the terrain on a still bloom night, when frost pools usually top out 30 to 200 feet up; winter's arctic pools run deeper and can cover benches that shed a spring frost. That's how the Dells, 60 feet above its local floor, plans colder than Baraboo yet reads 3°F warmer at bloom, while Rock Springs, down by the Upper Narrows, reads 6°F colder, the coldest spring reading of any named place on the map.

Baraboo, West Baraboo and the South Range

Baraboo sits mid-bowl on the river, which drops 40 feet in 4 miles through the Baraboo Rapids. Downtown and the Courthouse Square, 30 feet above the floor, plan for −32°F, MFTC zone 3b, typical winter −17°F; within 3 miles the benches plan for −30°F and the coldest tenth of the ground −33°F. Crawford Crossing, 1.3 miles south-southeast on a toe slope, plans for −33°F, and West Baraboo −32°F, with benches at −30°F. Climb out and it changes fast: A. G. Tuttle's old estate on Elizabeth Street, on a bench 160 feet up about a mile from downtown, plans for −30°F, zone 4a, and reads 5°F warmer at bloom. Skillet Creek's Pewits Nest gorge, on the southwest side, is a ravine of hemlock and yellow birch; glens like that pour cold air out their mouths at night, so don't plant at the foot of one.

South of town the South Range climbs to bluffs about 500 feet above Devil's Lake, which fills an old river valley through the range, plugged at both ends by moraines. A closed basin fills with cold air up to its lowest notch, and down at the lake, at 962 feet, the map plans for −30°F but reads 4°F colder than Baraboo at bloom; the lake, frozen much of the winter, doesn't help. Lakewood, on the high ground between Baraboo and the north end of the lake, 160 feet above the floor, plans for −30°F, zone 3b, and reads 6°F warmer at bloom. Ski-Hi Fruit Farm's address on Ski Hi Road sits on the north flank of the South Range at about 1,220 feet, 270 feet above the floor: −29°F, zone 4a, typical winter −14°F, 8°F warmer at bloom. Off the floor, below the crest, facing away from the sun so bloom holds back: we haven't seen the Bassetts say they picked it for frost, but it fits the textbook. At the range's east end, Durward's Glen, 190 feet above its floor, plans for −28°F and reads 9°F warmer.

The south face is a different animal: Devil's Head's ski runs drop 500 feet facing mostly south over the Wisconsin River. South slopes bloom earliest, and UW Extension warns they see bigger winter temperature swings and trunk injury from snow glare, so paint trunks white there.

On the Baraboo floor and in town lots, plant Haralson, Honeycrisp and Zestar!® apples, Evan's Bali tart cherry, Toka plum and honeyberry, and put anything tender by a south or west wall. Lakewood, the Tuttle bench, Ski-Hi's hill and Durward's Glen are the place for early bloomers: Westcot and Sungold apricots, Lapins sweet cherry and Contender peach (−30°F, only worth a try at Lakewood). Tom McCamant grows Contender at Forbidden Fruit Orchard in Paradise, Montana, and it's the only commercial peach we know of that has taken −32°F. Before you plant apricots, plums or sweet cherries, check our pollination maps for which varieties pollenize each other.

Reedsburg, Rock Springs, North Freedom and Loganville

Reedsburg sits on the Baraboo River upstream of the hills, where Babb, Hay and Copper creeks come in and early Shanty Row stood on poor ground by a black alder swamp. The town plans for −30°F, MFTC zone 4a, typical winter −17°F, 3°F colder than Baraboo at bloom, with the floor within 3 miles at −31°F and the benches at −27°F. NOAA's Reedsburg station read −36°F in the 2019 cold snap, yet its season beats Baraboo's: median last 32°F on May 4 and 153 frost-free days. Keep trees off the swampy river ground; UW Extension says to avoid water within 3 to 4 feet of the surface in spring.

Downstream, Rock Springs, the old Ableman, sits by the Upper Narrows among cliffs of Baraboo quartzite. It plans for −32°F, zone 3b, typical winter −18°F, and reads 6°F colder at bloom, while Diamond Hill, 0.8 mile southeast and 70 feet up, plans for −30°F, zone 4a, and reads 5°F warmer. North Freedom, below the narrows, plans for −32°F and reads 3°F colder, with benches at −29°F; LaRue, 2.4 miles southwest, plans for −32°F and reads 4°F colder. Loganville, on Highway 154 about 6.5 miles south of Reedsburg, plans for −31°F and reads 5°F colder, with benches at −29°F.

These bottoms take the floor list plus Frostbite apple and Kerr applecrab. Reedsburg's zone 4a ground and Diamond Hill can take Liberty apple and Stanley plum (−30°F) on the slope. Farther west in the Driftless, the Prairie du Chien, Richland Center and Kickapoo map covers you.

Wisconsin Dells, Lake Delton and the sand plain

Wisconsin Dells, the old Kilbourn City, sits on the Wisconsin River at the Dells, a 5-mile gorge with sandstone cliffs over 100 feet tall, split into Upper and Lower Dells by the Kilbourn Dam. The town point, 60 feet above its floor, plans for −34°F, MFTC zone 3b, typical winter −19°F, the coldest of the main towns, though it reads 3°F warmer than Baraboo at bloom. Within 3 miles the floor plans for −34°F and the benches −32°F. Oaklawn, on a bench 120 feet up about a mile east of downtown, plans for −32°F and reads 4°F warmer than Baraboo; Hickory Hills Estates, 2 miles southeast, plans for −32°F and reads 11°F warmer.

Lake Delton village, beside the reservoir on Dell Creek, plans for −33°F, typical winter −18°F, 3°F warmer at bloom, with the warmest tenth of its ground at −30°F. Delton Grand, half a mile east on a toe slope, plans for −34°F, the coldest planning low of any named place on the map, a shade colder than the Dells. Mirror Lake State Park, in Dell Creek's sandstone ravine, plans for −33°F. Both lakes are shallow (Lake Delton averages 12 feet), and shallow lakes freeze early. West and northwest of the Dells, Lyndon Station plans for −33°F and the Town of Lyndon −32°F, and both read 3°F colder than Baraboo at bloom; to the north, the Town of Dell Prairie, 50 feet up at 1,001 feet, plans for −32°F and reads 1°F warmer.

Plant the Dells floor from the coldest list below. Because the Dells reads warmer than Baraboo at bloom, its benches can take Summercrisp and Ure pears (−40°F) and Westcot apricot. UW Extension notes sandy soils need deeper rooting to ride out drought, so water deep and mulch.

Portage, Poynette, Lewiston and Endeavor

Portage sits east of the hills on a strip of marshy floodplain about 1.5 miles wide between the Fox and the Wisconsin, with downtown overlooking the Portage Canal. Downtown plans for −25°F, MFTC zone 4a, typical winter −12°F, the warmest planning low of any named place on the map, and reads 2°F colder than Baraboo at bloom. The floor within 3 miles plans for −29°F; downtown gets the map's small credit for built-up ground, since pavement and buildings hold heat on still nights. Pacific, southeast of the city, plans for −26°F; Dekorra, on a 10 percent toe slope, −28°F, with benches at −26°F; Poynette, on the map's east edge, −29°F, all zone 4a. Lapacek's Orchard in Poynette grows over 60 varieties, Zestar among them.

The river bottoms run colder. Anacker, 6 miles north of Portage, plans for −31°F and reads 6°F colder than Baraboo at bloom. Between the Dells and Portage the Wisconsin swings east across the sandy Lewiston basin of the old glacial lake. Aldo Leopold's Shack, on Levee Road, sits on that sand at 803 feet: −33°F, zone 3b, typical winter −18°F, 6°F colder at bloom. Lewiston, on the floor, plans for −31°F and reads 5°F colder. In Marquette County, Briggsville, on the east side of Mason Lake, and Endeavor, in the northeast corner, both plan for −32°F and read 3°F colder; Big Spring, west of Briggsville, plans for −33°F.

The Portage end grows the most: Lapins, Gold and Rainier (−30°F) sweet cherries, Superior, Italian and Stanley plums, Bartlett and D'Anjou (−30°F) pears and Contender peach. In downtown Portage, Blushingstar peach (−25°F) is worth a try; it came through −25°F at our place on January 13, 2024 without damage. The Lewiston and Endeavor bottoms are apple, haskap and bush-fruit ground; Ed Schultz, of Gallatin Gateway, Montana, saw zero winter injury on Centennial applecrab after a winter that hit −47°F. Madison and the Yahara lakes have their own Madison map.

Merrimac, Lake Wisconsin and the Sauk Prairie edge

At the south edge the Wisconsin widens into Lake Wisconsin, the reservoir behind the Prairie du Sac Dam. Merrimac sits at the ferry crossing near the head of the lake, on a toe slope 50 feet above the floor: −30°F, MFTC zone 3b, typical winter −17°F, 2°F warmer than Baraboo at bloom, with benches at −28°F. Goose Egg Hill, a mile south on a 26 percent slope 140 feet above the floor, plans for −30°F (3b) and reads 10°F warmer. The hamlet of Lake Wisconsin, 2.4 miles east on a 14 percent slope at 790 feet, plans for −27°F, zone 4a; Harmony Grove, on the river bottom at 777 feet, −31°F and 5°F colder at bloom.

The Lake Wisconsin wine region, mostly just south of this map, puts its vineyards at 800 to 900 feet on south- and southwest-facing slopes of 10 to 40 percent. Its federal ruling credits the river valley with keeping winters several degrees warmer than the land north and west of the river, and air movement in the valley with keeping frost pockets out of the vineyards. The map agrees on the slopes, but the bottoms read cold at bloom. A river floor is still a floor.

West of Merrimac and below the South Range, Bluffview sits beside the old Badger Army Ammunition Plant ground, now largely the Sauk Prairie Recreation Area. It plans for −32°F and reads 6°F colder than Baraboo at bloom; Maple Park, 1.3 miles south, plans for −31°F and reads 2°F colder. The Merrimac slopes can take Marquette and Frontenac (−35°F) and La Crescent (−40°F) grapes; UW Extension wants grapes on warm, sheltered, preferably south slopes.

Spring frost and bloom from Baraboo to Portage

NOAA's 1991 to 2020 frost dates run three weeks apart. Portage's median last 32°F is April 28; Reedsburg's is May 4, Lodi's May 13 and the Dells' May 14. Baraboo's station, on the valley floor, gets May 18, with 138 frost-free days and a median first fall frost of September 30, and in a late year (1 in 10) its last 32°F comes June 8. The last 28°F, about where open blossoms start dying, runs from April 13 at Portage to April 28 at Baraboo and April 30 at the Dells. A floor station runs later in spring than a bench or town site nearby, and Baraboo's sits on the lowest ground in town.

On the spring layer the cold spots are gorges and river bottoms: Rock Springs, the Leopold bottoms, Anacker and Bluffview 6°F colder than downtown Baraboo, Harmony Grove, Lewiston and Loganville 5°F colder. The warm spots are slopes: Hickory Hills Estates 11°F warmer, Goose Egg Hill 10°F, Durward's Glen 9°F, Ski-Hi's hill 8°F. A difference of 3°F to 4°F can separate no crop from a full one.

Height cuts the odds without removing them. In 2012 a March heat wave pushed bloom early, an April frost followed, and Wisconsin's apple crop fell 54 percent, the lowest since 1945; Ski-Hi was bare that year, and a late frost took its blossoms again in 2021. On a windy freeze night the warm-slope pattern doesn't hold.

Put apricots, peaches, plums and sweet cherries on your highest ground and apples, haskap and bush fruit lower: only about 15 percent of apple blossoms need to set for a crop, and open haskap flowers take 19°F. A north slope holds early bloomers back, and an east slope warms quickly on a frosty morning (Bob Purvis's rules). Frost cloth at 0.5, 0.9 and 1.5 ounces per square yard gains about 4°F, 6°F and 8°F. Mow short through bloom, and don't let woods or a windbreak at the bottom of the slope dam the cold; UW Extension warns that's how frost pockets get made.

What the weather records say

Baraboo's −45°F on January 30, 1951 ties the old Grand River Lock station, just off the map, for the lowest NOAA reading on file here. In that cold snap the Dells read −43°F, Reedsburg and Prairie du Sac −42°F, Arlington, up at 1,040 feet, −33°F, and Portage −30°F. Portage's own record is −37°F, from February 1, 1918. Cold comes late too: around March 1, 1962, Baraboo and Reedsburg hit −34°F, and March cold can catch trees that have started losing hardiness. The floor-and-hill pattern doesn't hold every night: in the January 1994 snap, Arlington, up at 1,052 feet, read −36°F, same as Baraboo and the Dells.

A local naturalist site's ice record for Devil's Lake, back to 1922, puts the ice season at about 113 days before 1980 and about 105 days since 2004, and the three shortest seasons on record are the last three. Downtown Baraboo's typical winter, −17°F, falls in USDA's 5a range, and the Lake Wisconsin wine region is described as zone 5a to 5b (we haven't confirmed USDA's own 2023 zone for Baraboo). Our MFTC zone reads more than a full zone colder because USDA's is built on an average winter and ours on the bad night we plan for.

What you can grow here

Portage, the hillsides and the zone 4a slopes, −25°F to −29°F. Downtown Portage, Pacific, Dekorra, Poynette, the Lake Wisconsin hamlet, Durward's Glen and Ski-Hi's hill. Good picks: Honeycrisp, Zestar!®, Paula Red and Arkansas Black apples, plus Tolman Sweet and Liberty (−30°F); Summercrisp, Bartlett and D'Anjou pears; Toka, Superior, Italian and Stanley plums; Lapins, Gold and Rainier sweet cherries (Rainier cracks where it rains at ripening); Montmorency and Evan's Bali tart cherries; Westcot, Sungold and Hardy Iowa apricots; Siberian C, the hardiest peach we think is out there (very late ripening), and Contender; and Marquette, Frontenac and La Crescent grapes.

Valley floors, toe slopes and town lots, −30°F to −32°F. Downtown Baraboo, West Baraboo, North Freedom, Rock Springs, Reedsburg, Loganville, Lewiston, Endeavor, Briggsville, Merrimac, Lakewood, the Tuttle bench, Diamond Hill, Oaklawn and Hickory Hills. Good picks: Haralson, Honeycrisp, Wolf River and Frostbite (−45°F), Zestar!® and Cortland (−40°F) and Paula Red and Freedom (−35°F) apples; Kerr and Centennial applecrabs; Evan's Bali and Meteor tart cherries; Toka and Alderman plums; Westcot apricot on the slope; honeyberry, Montana Black Currant, Red Lake currant, Invicta gooseberry and Boyne raspberry. Lapins, Gold, Superior and Siberian C (−35°F) clear these numbers but bloom early, so give them the high side of the lot, and keep pears off the floor. Liberty and Tolman Sweet (−30°F) are worth a try on higher ground.

The Dells floor and the coldest bottoms, −33°F to −34°F. Wisconsin Dells, Lake Delton, Delton Grand, Lyndon Station, Big Spring and Crawford Crossing. Stick with what has come through −40°F or colder: Norda and Mantet (−50°F), Haralson, Honeycrisp and Frostbite (−45°F) and Zestar!® (−40°F) apples; Kerr, Centennial and Chestnut applecrabs and Trailman (−60°F); Evan's Bali and Meteor tart cherries; Toka plum; honeyberry, the currants and Nanking Cherry. If you plant only one tree there, make it Kerr or Trailman.

Rootstocks, site and soil. UW Extension's list for southern Wisconsin gives apple stocks from B.9, M.9, G.11, G.41, M.26, G.935 and G.30 to M.7; pears on OH x F 97, 87 or 333 (quince-rooted dwarf pears aren't hardy here); Krymsk 5 as the hardiest dwarfing sweet cherry stock; Prunus americana for full-size plums; and Manchurian apricot stock for apricots. Roots are the weak link, and G.935's measured among the hardiest of those apple stocks (3°F to −2°F, against 11°F to 7°F for M.26), so use it where snow won't stay. Plant on a 4 to 8 percent slope (Montana State's advice), off the floor and off the windswept crest. UW wants soil pH at 5.8 to 6.8 and doesn't recommend nectarines, Japanese plums or European grapes here. Taper water from mid-August so trees harden off.

Fruit history here

A 1911 encyclopedia called small fruits an important crop around Baraboo and noted a large nursery in the city. A. G. Tuttle came from New England as a merchant and nurseryman, built his house (now the A. G. Tuttle Estate) in 1869, developed local fruit, especially apples, sold a Russian apple that drew customers from Wisconsin and Minnesota, and served several years as president of the Wisconsin Horticultural Society. A 1911 to 1912 nursery catalog called his Tuttle's Winter apple his life's crowning effort.

In 1907 A. K. Bassett bought land on the South Range, cleared the forest and planted apples, and his family still runs Ski-Hi Fruit Farm. UW-Madison's horticulture people have used it for research and teaching since 1932, once testing up to 112 apple cultivars at a time, and its oldest tree is a Tolman Sweet more than 80 years old. Agoston Haraszthy planted European grapes near Prairie du Sac in 1847, on what's now Wollersheim's ground, and left for California two years later after cold winters hurt the vines. The Lake Wisconsin wine region became Wisconsin's first in 1994, and French hybrids have done best there, Marechal Foch above all.

Questions people ask

What hardiness zone is Baraboo, Wisconsin?

Downtown Baraboo plans for −32°F, MFTC zone 3b, with a typical winter of −17°F. The hillsides above town, like Ski-Hi's hill and the Tuttle bench, plan for −29°F to −30°F, zone 4a. The typical winter falls in USDA's 5a range; USDA's zone is based on an average winter, ours on the bad night we plan for.

When is the last frost in Baraboo?

NOAA station records for 1991 to 2020 put the median last 32°F at May 18 at the Baraboo station, which sits low on the valley floor, and June 8 in a late year (1 in 10). The last 28°F comes around April 28. Wisconsin Dells' median is May 14, Reedsburg's May 4 and Portage's April 28.

What fruit trees grow in Wisconsin Dells?

Wisconsin Dells plans for −34°F, MFTC zone 3b, the coldest of the main towns here. Plant what has come through −40°F or colder: Haralson, Honeycrisp and Zestar!® apples, Kerr applecrab, Evan's Bali tart cherry, Toka plum, honeyberry and currants. The Dells reads warmer than Baraboo at bloom, so its benches can also take Summercrisp and Ure pears and Westcot apricot.

Can you grow peaches in Baraboo?

Siberian C (−35°F) clears downtown Baraboo's −32°F planning low, and Contender (−30°F) fits the zone 4a hillsides like Ski-Hi's hill and the Tuttle bench. Peaches bloom early and Baraboo's floor frosts late, so plant them high on the slope and count on the tree before the crop.

Where are the frost pockets around Baraboo?

The river bottoms and the gorges. On a still bloom night Rock Springs and Bluffview read 6°F colder than downtown Baraboo, and Devil's Lake and LaRue 4°F colder. The slopes are the opposite: Ski-Hi's hill reads 8°F warmer and Lakewood 6°F warmer.

What apple came from Baraboo?

Tuttle's Winter, originated by Baraboo nurseryman A. G. Tuttle, a president of the Wisconsin Horticultural Society. A 1911 to 1912 nursery catalog called it his life's crowning effort and the tree hardy and very vigorous.

Warmer spots, colder spots

Here's the number to plan for at named places on the map, warmest first. Each one is the 1-in-30-year low for that spot: the cold hardiness calculator's number from the same weather stations, sharpened by our microclimate model for the ground right there. Zone is our MFTC zone, set by that one bad night, not by an average.

The weather stations behind it

These are the long-record stations in and around this map, with each one's own numbers since the winter of 1995-96. The last column is this map's 30-year number right at the station, which won't match the station exactly: it's a blend of the stations around it, the way the calculator works everywhere.

Source: NOAA records through ACIS, winters 1995-96 through 2025-26. What the "carried forward," "gaps filled" and AWOS rows mean is explained in how our microclimate maps work.