Fruit Trees for Kingston, New Paltz, Poughkeepsie and the Mid-Hudson Valley, New York

On April 21, 2026, a week after a heat spell over 90°F pushed the orchards into bloom, a freeze came down on the mid-Hudson. At Fishkill Farms in Hopewell Junction unprotected spots fell to 23°F, and the high ground didn't get the inversion that usually protects it. The farm lost all its pears and nearly all its peaches, while some of its apples still looked set for full crops. That's fruit trees for Kingston, New Paltz, Poughkeepsie and the mid-Hudson Valley in one night: winter here is mild enough for nearly everything we sell, and bloom is where a crop gets made or lost.

This map covers the Hudson from the Highlands north to Saugerties and Germantown, with the Wallkill and Moodna valleys, the Marlboro Mountains, the Rondout Valley and the Catskill front out to Woodstock. 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, plus a small nudge for the ground right around you. It's a safe number to plan for, not the record. The MFTC zone is that number in half zones, and 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 Poughkeepsie on a still, clear night at bloom.

Poughkeepsie plans for −15°F, MFTC zone 5b, with a typical winter of −2°F. The middle of the growing ground plans for −18°F, and half of it falls between −20°F and −16°F. The warm end is the Highlands and the high slopes, like Highland Falls and Mohonk Lake (−12°F). The cold end is the hill country inland of Hyde Park and Rhinebeck, where DeWitt Mills plans for −25°F, and Phoenicia up the Esopus (−24°F). Most of our list clears all of that. The spring layer spreads much wider: Crane Farm near Bloomingburg reads 6°F warmer than Poughkeepsie, and Salt Point 16°F colder.

Why the map looks the way it does

The Hudson is at sea level the whole length of this map, a tidal river all the way up to Troy, and everything drains to it: Esopus Creek to Saugerties, the Wallkill and Rondout Creek to Kingston, the Moodna to Newburgh Bay, and Wappinger and Fishkill creeks off the Dutchess hills. On a clear, calm night cold air slides off the Catskills, the Shawangunks, the Marlboro Mountains and the Highlands and settles in those creek valleys and the flats along them. Most of a pool's chill is made right where it sits, as the ground radiates to a clear sky, and the drainage piles more on top.

The old station records show it plainly. Wappingers Falls, at 114 feet, holds the coldest reading on file inside the map, −34°F on January 5, 1904, and it ran a median 7°F colder on the year's coldest night than the old Poughkeepsie city station 4 miles away at nearly the same height. The Poughkeepsie airport runs 8°F colder than that city station. In the January 1961 cold snap the airport hit −30°F, its record, while West Point read −7°F and Mohonk Lake, up on the ridge at 1,104 feet, only −3°F. That's 27°F of difference, with the warm station about 950 feet higher.

That warm layer over the pool is the thermal belt. Within 3 miles of nearly every town, the benches 100 to 700 feet above the floor plan for 2°F to 4°F warmer than the floor (−15°F against −19°F around Goshen). Height above your own floor is what counts. Stone Ridge, on a bench 180 feet over the Rondout Valley, plans for −16°F and reads even with Poughkeepsie at bloom, while High Falls, on the floor less than 2 miles away, plans for −20°F and reads 12°F colder. A Hungarian study of 69 clear, calm nights found a valley floor averaged 6.7°F colder than a slope 230 feet up.

It's a calm-night pattern, and it can break. On the deepest arctic nights the cold fills more of the valley (in January 1994 Middletown, at 700 feet, set its record of −23°F), and on a night with no inversion, like April 21, 2026, high ground can do worse than low.

The south end runs mildest. West Point, at 320 feet above the river where it cuts through the Highlands, averages −2°F for its coldest night and runs a median 9°F warmer than the Poughkeepsie airport. The river is deep there, and open water holds heat, but a river floor is still a floor: the flats at Staatsburg and Kingston Point plan for −21°F to −22°F and read 10°F to 11°F colder than Poughkeepsie at bloom. Downtown Poughkeepsie, Newburgh and Kingston sit on benches 120 to 160 feet above the floor, and the map credits built-up ground with up to 2.5°F for the heat a town holds on a still night.

The spring layer is the same drainage at full strength. Its coldest readings on growing ground are creek bottoms and inland flats, and its warmest are slopes the cold drains off, like Crane Farm and Skyline Trail (6°F warmer than Poughkeepsie), Oakes (5°F) and Mohonk Lake (4°F).

Poughkeepsie, Wappingers Falls and Hyde Park

Poughkeepsie climbs from the river to College Hill, 380 feet up. Downtown, on a bench 160 feet above the floor, plans for −15°F; within 3 miles the benches plan for −15°F and the floor −18°F. Fairview plans for −16°F and reads 3°F colder at bloom, and Arlington (−16°F) and Crown Heights (−15°F) read 6°F colder. South of the city Myers Corner, on a bench 150 feet up, plans for −14°F and reads 2°F warmer, and Wappingers Falls village plans for −15°F and reads about even. Inland it falls off fast. New Hackensack plans for −18°F and reads 10°F colder at bloom, Pleasant Valley, on its river bottom, −20°F and 11°F colder, and Salt Point, on a creek bottom, −23°F and 16°F colder. Clark Heights, on a 14 percent hillside about a mile from Pleasant Valley, plans for −18°F and reads even with Poughkeepsie. Upriver, Hyde Park, on a bench 170 feet up, plans for −18°F and reads 6°F colder.

Downtown, Myers Corner and Wappingers Falls can carry early bloomers: Harlayne and Tomcot apricots (−30°F), Contender peaches (−30°F), Stella sweet cherries (−25°F) and Bing (−20°F). On the inland bottoms, a bloom night 10°F to 16°F colder than downtown is hard on stone fruit. Plant Empire apples there (−35°F), one of the valley's most common, with Honeyberry (−50°F), whose open flowers take 19°F, and Red Lake currants (−40°F).

Rhinebeck, Red Hook and Tivoli

Northern Dutchess is the cold corner of the east bank. Rhinebeck village sits on a bench 130 feet up and still plans for −22°F, MFTC zone 4b, with a typical winter of −7°F, and within 3 miles the benches and the floor both plan for −22°F. When benches don't beat the floor, the stations are setting the number more than the terrain, and the stations out here run cold. In the January 1981 cold snap Millbrook, at 820 feet on the map's east edge, read −28°F while the Poughkeepsie airport read −20°F. Milan plans for −23°F and DeWitt Mills −25°F. Tivoli, on a bench 150 feet above its floor, plans for −19°F and reads 2°F colder than Poughkeepsie, and Germantown, on a hillside, −19°F and even. Red Hook village, on the floor, plans for −22°F and reads 9°F colder, and Clermont −20°F and 10°F colder.

Everything we rate −25°F or colder still clears −22°F. On Tivoli's bench and the Germantown slopes, plant Siberian C peaches, Lapins and Black Gold sweet cherries and Italian plums (all −35°F); Bing clears there too. On the Red Hook and Clermont floors, stick with apples like Cortland and Red McIntosh (−40°F), Meteor tart cherries (−40°F) and bush fruit. North of Germantown, our Albany, Schenectady and Troy map picks up.

Newburgh Bay and the Highlands: Beacon, Newburgh and Cold Spring

Below Newburgh Bay the Hudson cuts through the Highlands, with Mount Beacon (1,540 feet) on the east bank and Schunemunk Mountain (1,664 feet) to the west. This is the mildest winter ground on the map. Cold Spring plans for −13°F, MFTC zone 5b, with a typical winter of 0°F, and Highland Falls and Graymoor −12°F. Bloom is patchier. Graymoor, on a hillside 360 feet up, reads 3°F warmer than Poughkeepsie, but Cold Spring and Highland Falls sit in draws and read 6°F colder, and Garrison, in a draw right at the river, 12°F colder.

Beacon, on a bench under Mount Beacon, plans for −15°F but reads 8°F colder at bloom, while Groveville, on the hillside, reads 1°F warmer. Fishkill, on the floor, plans for −17°F and reads 8°F colder; Brinckerhoff, on a 15 percent hillside, −16°F and 2°F warmer; Hopewell Junction, floor ground, −18°F and 11°F colder. Across the bay, downtown Newburgh plans for −15°F and reads 1°F warmer than Poughkeepsie, and Balmville, 290 feet up just north of the city, −15°F and 3°F warmer. Cornwall-on-Hudson, on a bench above the river, plans for −14°F. Inland it turns: Washingtonville, on the floor, plans for −19°F and reads 10°F colder, and Vails Gate Junction, in a draw, reads 10°F colder while Vails Gate, half a mile off, reads 2°F colder.

Chicago Hardy Fig (−10°F) is worth a try against a south wall in Cold Spring, Highland Falls or Graymoor. Santa Rosa plums and Arctic Glo and Flavortop nectarines (−20°F) clear every planning low in this section. Put apricots, peaches and sweet cherries on the warm slopes (Graymoor, Balmville, Brinckerhoff), and give the draws and the Washingtonville and Hopewell Junction floors to apples like Spartan (−40°F) and gooseberries like Invicta (−40°F).

Marlboro, Milton, Highland and Clintondale

The Marlboro Mountains run along the west bank (Marlboro Mountain is 1,127 feet), with the river hamlets on their east face. That face is the classic Hudson fruit slope: morning sun, and a steep fall to the river so cold air keeps moving past the trees. Prospect Hill Orchards in Milton dates to 1817. Milton, on a 13 percent hillside, plans for −14°F, zone 5b, and reads within 2°F of Poughkeepsie at bloom. Marlboro, 190 feet above the floor, plans for −16°F and reads 3°F warmer, and Oakes, in the town of Lloyd 280 feet up, −13°F and 5°F warmer. Cornell's Highland lab has its orchard on this kind of ground, at about 400 feet on an east-facing slope that drains cold air toward the river, and it still hit 18.9°F on April 5, 2016. Back from the river face the spring readings drop: Lattintown, in western Marlborough, and Modena, west of the ridge, read 9°F colder at bloom. Clintondale, on a bench 160 feet up, plans for −16°F and reads about 3°F colder.

On the river face, plant what blooms first: Goldrich and Wenatchee Moorpark apricots, Rainier and Skeena sweet cherries, Bill's Nectar peachcot and Tipson plumcot (all −30°F). The Antwerp raspberry made Marlboro's name in the 1800s, and raspberries fit anywhere here: Boyne and Nova (−50°F) and Royalty purple (−30°F). On the flats around Plattekill and Modena, plant apples and bush fruit and keep pears off the low ground.

New Paltz, Gardiner and the Wallkill Valley

The Wallkill comes north past Walden's old mill dams and Gardiner and spreads into a broad floodplain at New Paltz, under the Shawangunk Ridge. New Paltz, on a hillside 80 feet above the floor, plans for −17°F, zone 5a, and reads 3°F colder than Poughkeepsie at bloom; within 3 miles the floor plans for −19°F and the benches −16°F. Gardiner, on the floor, plans for −17°F and reads 5°F colder, and Galeville, on the river bottom, −20°F and 12°F colder. Walden plans for −21°F, and East Walden, on the flat, reads 15°F colder at bloom. Montgomery, in a creek bottom, plans for −19°F and reads 13°F colder. The station a mile east-southeast of Walden runs a median 10°F colder than West Point on the year's coldest night, and its median last 32°F frost comes May 6. Mohonk Lake, 990 feet above the floor, plans for −12°F and reads 4°F warmer at bloom, and its lake ice goes out around April 5 in an average year.

The New Paltz slopes and the ridge face take Contender and Siberian C peaches, Lapins cherries, and Superior plums with Toka (−45°F), a good pollenizer for Superior (our pollination maps show other pairings). The bottoms from Walden to Galeville are apple ground: Liberty (−35°F) and Northern Spy (−30°F), Golden Russet (−40°F), and Invicta gooseberries. They flood, too; the Wallkill's record flood came in August 1955.

Middletown, Goshen and the Orange County hills

West of the Highlands, Orange County is where the Great Appalachian Valley opens up and ends. Middletown plans for −16°F on a valley floor 80 feet above the lowest ground and reads 8°F colder than Poughkeepsie at bloom, and the old Middletown station, at 700 feet, has a median last frost of April 15, three weeks ahead of Walden. Scotchtown, 280 feet above its floor, plans for −14°F and reads 1°F warmer. The Ridgebury subdivisions south of the city, on hillsides, plan for −15°F to −16°F, and Crane Farm, 650 feet up near Bloomingburg, reads 6°F warmer. Goshen, on the floor, plans for −17°F and reads 10°F colder, with benches at −15°F within 3 miles. Sunset Ridge near Goshen, despite the name, is on a toe slope and reads 10°F colder, and Farmingdale, east of Goshen, 16°F colder. Near Chester, Ashford Estates, on a hillside 160 feet up, plans for −15°F and reads 3°F warmer, while Surrey Meadows, a few hundred yards down the toe slope, reads 11°F colder. Near Woodbury, Skyline Trail, 350 feet up, reads 6°F warmer, and West Point Farms, half a mile off, 9°F colder.

The hillsides take Glohaven peaches (−25°F), Shiro plums (−30°F), apricots and sweet cherries. On the floors and toe slopes, plant Macoun apples (−35°F), Montmorency tart cherries (−35°F) and Honeoye strawberries (−50°F). Fishkill Farms' strawberries looked fine after the 2026 freeze.

Kingston, Port Ewen and Saugerties

Kingston sits where Rondout Creek meets the Hudson. The city center, on a bench 150 feet above the floor, plans for −18°F, MFTC zone 5a, with a typical winter of −4°F, and reads 6°F colder than Poughkeepsie at bloom; Uptown, the Stockade, plans for −19°F. Down on the water Ponckhockie plans for −20°F, and Kingston Point, on the river flat, −22°F and 11°F colder at bloom. East Kingston, on a steep hillside, plans for −19°F but reads even with Poughkeepsie, and so does Port Ewen across the Rondout, on a bench 190 feet up, while Connelly, down at 20 feet, reads 12°F colder. Hurley, on the valley floor, plans for −18°F and reads 8°F colder. Saugerties, where Esopus Creek reaches the river, plans for −19°F on a bench 150 feet up and reads 1°F colder. West Camp, 210 feet above its floor, plans for −17°F and reads 2°F warmer, and Glenerie, at the foot of a steep slope, reads 10°F colder.

Robert Pell's 20 acre orchard at Esopus grew Newtown Pippin (−30°F) for export to England in the early 1820s, and it fits anywhere here. The slopes at Port Ewen, East Kingston and West Camp read warm enough for Risingstar peaches (−25°F) and pears like Seckel (−35°F) and Harrow Sweet (−30°F). On Kingston Point, Connelly and the Hurley flats, plant apples like Roxbury Russet (−30°F), plus haskap and currants.

The Rondout Valley, the Ashokan and Woodstock

The Rondout Valley is a low flat between the Shawangunk Ridge and the Catskill front, and cold air comes off both walls into it. Ellenville, at the foot of the Shawangunks, plans for −20°F, zone 4b, and reads 9°F colder than Poughkeepsie at bloom; within 3 miles the floor plans for −21°F and the benches −16°F. Down the valley Kerhonkson plans for −21°F and Accord −18°F, both 10°F colder at bloom, and Kyserike reads 14°F colder. The benches are another world. Stone Ridge, 180 feet up, plans for −16°F and reads even with Poughkeepsie, and Sholam, 370 feet up at 1,235 feet, −16°F and 1°F warmer. At the lower end Rosendale, on the river bottom at 71 feet, reads 14°F colder.

Don't count on the Ashokan Reservoir to warm its shore. The benches above it are what read well, like Shokan (−17°F, 3°F colder at bloom) and West Hurley (−17°F, even with Poughkeepsie), while Boiceville, on the Esopus above the reservoir, plans for −21°F and reads 13°F colder. Woodstock lies along the Saw Kill on the lower slopes of Overlook Mountain. The village plans for −21°F and reads 4°F colder at bloom and Bearsville 12°F colder, but Byrdcliffe, 250 feet up the slopes of Mount Guardian, plans for −18°F and reads just 1°F colder.

On the benches and at Byrdcliffe, plant peaches, apricots, Stanley plums (−30°F) and sweet cherries. In the bottoms, plant Ashmead's Kernel (−35°F) and Liberty apples, American elderberry (−50°F) and Red Lake currants.

Spring frost and bloom in the Hudson Valley

NOAA station records for 1991 to 2020 put West Point's median last 32°F frost on April 11, with 201 frost-free days. Middletown gets its last 32°F April 15, Mohonk Lake April 20, the Poughkeepsie airport April 30 (last 28°F April 16, 162 days), and Walden and the Montgomery airport not until May 6, with 151 and 158 days. One spring in ten the last 32°F comes May 15 or later at the Poughkeepsie airport and May 19 or later at Walden. That's 25 days between the Highlands and the Wallkill bottoms.

Early warmth is the trap. Cornell's Jared Buono says Hudson Valley trees wake earlier than upstate's because the valley is farther south. In 2016 McIntosh at the Highland lab hit green tip on March 16, about three weeks early. On April 5 and 6 it went to 18.9°F at the lab and single digits in Columbia County. At a West Marlboro orchard Cornell found only about 24 percent of one apple variety's buds sound, against 80 to 89 percent at the lab, and its note says buds on colder sites were held back and better protected. In 2026 Quartz Rock Vineyard in Marlboro expected no plums or cherries at all.

Open blossoms of nearly every tree fruit start dying near 28°F (Michigan State's figures), but only about 15 percent of apple blossoms need to set for a crop, and haskap flowers take 19°F wide open. So put apricots, peaches, plums and sweet cherries where the spring layer reads within a few degrees of Poughkeepsie or warmer, and leave ground that reads 8°F or more colder to apples and bush fruit. An east-facing slope warms quickly on a frosty morning, and a north slope holds apricots and plums back. Through bloom, mow short, don't till, and water a day or two before a frost night. Cornell's Jentsch says wind machines and helicopters only help under an inversion. Frost cloth helps a backyard tree; Alabama's extension puts the gain at 4°F to 8°F, depending on the fabric's weight.

What the weather records say

The coldest reading on file inside the map is −34°F at Wappingers Falls on January 5, 1904. The Poughkeepsie airport's record is −30°F (January 21, 1961), Mohonk Lake hit −24°F on December 30, 1917, Middletown −23°F on January 27, 1994, and West Point, the mildest long record here, −17°F on February 9, 1934, in the cold wave that took Wappingers Falls to −29°F. Since the 1995-96 winter the stations have stayed milder (the Montgomery airport's coldest is −17°F, on January 28, 2005), and the Poughkeepsie airport's own 30-year number, −16°F, is colder than the −14°F it has recorded in that time. NOAA station records show the worst night in about 30 winters runs a median 13°F below a station's average winter low, and that's the night we plan for.

A local garden center calls the Hudson Valley zone 6, and the Hudson River Region wine district spans USDA zones 5b to 7b. USDA's map is built on the average winter's coldest night, so it reads warmer than our MFTC zones, which run mostly 4b to 5b here.

What you can grow here

Our ratings are each plant's coldest known survival, so compare them straight to your number. Most of the list clears winter almost anywhere on this map; the real choice is which kinds go where they'll bloom safely.

The Highlands, river slopes and high benches, −16°F or warmer (Cold Spring, Graymoor, Balmville, downtown Newburgh, Milton, Marlboro, Oakes, Mohonk Lake, Scotchtown, Stone Ridge): Blushingstar (−30°F), Contender and Siberian C peaches, Hardired (−25°F) and Arctic Glo nectarines, Harlayne and Tomcot apricots, Rainier, Stella and Bing cherries, Italian and Santa Rosa plums, Persimmon (Montana Trial) (−25°F), Montana Trial Pawpaw (−30°F), and St. Edmund's Pippin (−20°F) and Baldwin (−20°F) apples. Chicago Hardy Fig is worth a try where the number is −15°F or warmer.

Valley floors and the Wallkill and Rondout bottoms, −17°F to −21°F (Kingston, Saugerties, Hyde Park, Fishkill, New Paltz, Walden, Montgomery, Goshen, Ellenville, Woodstock): Honeycrisp (−45°F), Empire, Spartan, Liberty and Newtown Pippin apples, Meteor and Montmorency tart cherries, Honeyberry, Red Lake currants and Boyne raspberries. Pears like Bartlett (−35°F) and D'Anjou (−30°F) go on the higher corners of this ground, not the bottoms.

The cold northeast and the Catskill bottoms, −22°F to −25°F (Rhinebeck, Red Hook, Milan, Salt Point, DeWitt Mills, Zena, Phoenicia): Zestar!®, Cortland and Red McIntosh apples (−40°F), Kerr applecrab (−50°F), Evan's Bali tart cherries (−45°F), Lapins, Toka and Superior where the spring reading is good, and Montana Black Currant (−50°F). Bing and Santa Rosa are worth a try in a sheltered spot with a good spring reading.

Plant on a slope, but not on a windswept hilltop and not in the bottom. Hudson Valley orchards went on 3 to 6 percent slopes, close to the 4 to 8 percent grade Montana State recommends, and big growers spread their trees across sites to split the frost and hail risk. Test drainage on the creek flats, and don't push trees late with nitrogen or heavy water. Watch for brown marmorated stink bug, and for fire blight, which Cornell's Highland lab studies.

Fruit history in the Hudson Valley

Records from 1671 mention "Indian Orchards" in Ulster County, and a commercial peach orchard near West Park was on record by 1766. In 1790 the Farmers Turnpike carried goods to the Milton docks for sloops to New York. The Esopus Spitzenburg came from near Esopus and its seedling Jonathan from Woodstock, though the sources disagree on who found it and when. A. J. Caywood and Son of Marlborough ran about 60 acres of fruit and nursery by 1887, and in 1941 M. G. Hurd of Clintondale built the country's first successful commercial controlled-atmosphere apple storage room. The vines go back nearly as far: the first were planted at New Paltz in 1677.

Questions people ask

What growing zone is Kingston, NY?

Kingston plans for −18°F, MFTC zone 5a, with a typical winter of −4°F. A local garden center calls the valley zone 6; USDA's map is built on an average winter's coldest night, ours on the bad night we plan for. Port Ewen and East Kingston plan for −19°F but read about 6°F warmer than downtown at bloom.

When is the last frost in the Hudson Valley?

NOAA station records for 1991 to 2020 put the Poughkeepsie airport's median last 32°F frost on April 30 and its last 28°F on April 16, and one spring in ten the last 32°F comes May 15 or later. The Highlands run earlier (West Point, April 11) and the Wallkill bottoms later (Walden and the Montgomery airport, May 6).

Can you grow peaches in the Hudson Valley?

Yes. Contender (−30°F), Blushingstar (−30°F) and Siberian C (−35°F) clear the planning low at every named place on this map. The risk is bloom and late winter: Valentine's Day cold in 2016 wiped out the upper Hudson Valley peach crop, and the April 2026 freeze took nearly all of Fishkill Farms' peaches. Plant them on slopes that read warm at bloom, like Marlboro's river face or Balmville, never in a creek bottom.

Where are the frost pockets in the Hudson Valley?

On a still spring night the coldest named places we checked on growing ground are Salt Point and Farmingdale, 16°F colder than Poughkeepsie, East Walden, 15°F colder, and Rosendale and Kyserike, 14°F colder. For winter cold, the hills inland of Hyde Park and Rhinebeck (DeWitt Mills −25°F) and Phoenicia (−24°F) are the coldest ground.

Does the Hudson River keep the valley warmer?

Less than you'd think. It often froze shore to shore before Coast Guard icebreaking began in the late 1930s, and now it rarely freezes across. West Point, 320 feet above it in the Highlands, is the mildest long record on the map. But the flats right on the water at Staatsburg and Kingston Point plan for −21°F to −22°F, because cold air drains down to the river and pools there.

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.