Bear Creek, Alabama, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Bear Creek, 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 Bear Creek 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 Bear Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Bear Creek — the short answer
Bear Creek, Alabama: USDA zone 8a, about 245 days between hard freezes, across 9K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~245
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 9K 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 8a is Bear Creek's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bear Creek's 245-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bear Creek
Each reading below is measured for Bear Creek itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBear Creek runs about 245 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
MeasuredBear Creek sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a.
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 Bear Creek is in
Bear Creek sits in the Southwestern Appalachians — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bear Creek's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Marion County is mostly Southeastern Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Bear Creek
Every plant below cleared Bear Creek's own zone 8a and its 245-day season. Each card opens that plant's Alabama profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bear Creek?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 14 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 14 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
What's on the federal record near Bear Creek
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bear Creek. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BEAR CREEK HIGH SCHOOL BUS SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- H&L SERVICE STATION (T&L)Underground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- H M OPERATING INCBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- H M OPERATING INCToxics Release Inventory · 0.9 mi
- Well A-10 TOWN OF BEAR CREEK Marion County AlNitrate · 1.4 mi
- TOWN OF BEAR CREEKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- BEAR CREEK STORE & DEER PROCESSINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- TRENT SPAIN FARMCAFO · 1.9 mi
- R&D FUEL CO (COOPS)Underground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- KNOX DRILLING COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- DAVIS GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- RYDER TRUCK RENTAL-HALEYVILLEBrownfields · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bear Creek'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 Bear Creek.
Total Sites
201
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bear Creek, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Bear Creek — CAFO (35 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (24 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Bear Creek
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 Bear Creek average
Your land is one point inside Bear Creek
Everything above resolves to Bear Creek as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 9K 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 Bear Creek Average
Bear Creek Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Bear Creek
- ●One soil character for all of Bear Creek
- ●Frost dates read at Bear Creek's scale: Mar 14 to Nov 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bear Creek's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bear Creek
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bear Creek, Alabama — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bear Creek averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bear Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bear Creek average
How we know this about Bear Creek
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 Bear Creek’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 Bear Creek
When does frost risk typically end in Bear Creek?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bear Creek typically lands around Mar 14, 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 4.
When is the first frost in Bear Creek?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bear Creek typically arrives around Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 31, so the watching starts about Oct 15 — about 245 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bear Creek?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bear Creek sees about 245 frost-free days — roughly Mar 14 through Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 4 to Oct 31, about 210 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bear Creek?
The federal record around Bear Creek is a meaningful one — 201 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (93), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Bear Creek?
From about Oct 15 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 14 (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 14. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bear Creek's scale — its 8a band and its 245-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bear Creek'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 Bear Creek’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Bear Creek's own scale — its own ~245-day season between 28°F freezes, the 8,721 acres it covers and 201 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bear Creek's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bear Creek's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 14 and Nov 14 and the ~245-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 201 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bear Creek, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bear Creek's boundary and the 8,721 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~245-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Bear Creek sits in the Southwestern Appalachians — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bear Creek's 8,721 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Marion County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Marion County
- The growing challenges every Alabama grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Alabama
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Marion County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bear Creek's 8,721 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bear Creek you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 8,721 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Bear Creek-wide figureread your own land →
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