Saks, Alabama, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Saks, 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 Saks 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 Saks — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Saks — the short answer
Saks, Alabama: USDA zone 8a, about 246 days between hard freezes, across 8K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- Calhoun County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 16
- Calhoun County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~246
- Calhoun County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 8K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Calhoun County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8a is Saks's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Saks's 246-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Saks
Each reading below is measured for Saks itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsSaks runs about 246 days between hard freezes (read from Calhoun County, the closest normal to Saks) — 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
MeasuredSaks 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 Saks is in
Saks sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Saks's own centroid rather than borrowed from Calhoun County.
What Grows in Saks
Every plant below cleared Saks's own zone 8a and its 246-day season. Each card opens that plant's Alabama profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Saks?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 16 — 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 Saks
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Saks. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ALDOT DISTRICT 2 ANNISTONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- DBA RITE AID #07087Brownfields · 1800 ft
- WALGREENS #19256Brownfields · 1900 ft
- MAPCO 5116Underground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- RACEWAY #847Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- APS PETROLEUM EQUIPMENTBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- TURLEYS BODY SHOPBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- JACKIE'S AUTO BODY SHOPBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- PIT STOP #7Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SOUTHERN REDI MIXBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- DISCOUNT FOOD MART #5123Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- CALHOUN CO COMMISSIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Saks'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 Saks.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Saks
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Saks
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Saks, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Saks — Superfund (28 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (51 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Saks
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 Saks average
Your land is one point inside Saks
Everything above resolves to Saks as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 8K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Calhoun County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 Saks Average
Saks Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Saks
- ●One soil character for all of Saks
- ●Frost dates read at Saks's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 16
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Saks's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Saks
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Saks, Alabama — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Saks averages can't show:
We read public map data around Saks — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Saks average
How we know this about Saks
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 Calhoun County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 Saks
When does frost risk typically end in Saks?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Saks typically lands around Mar 15, 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 5.
When is the first frost in Saks?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Saks typically arrives around Nov 16, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 2, so the watching starts about Oct 17 — about 246 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Saks?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Saks sees about 246 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 16, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Nov 2, about 211 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Saks?
The federal record around Saks runs heavier than most — 617 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (299), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Saks?
From about Oct 17 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 16 (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 16. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Saks's scale — its 8a band and its 246-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Saks'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 Saks’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Saks's own scale — the 7,793 acres it covers and 617 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Saks's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 617 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Saks, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Saks's boundary and the 7,793 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~246-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Saks's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Saks has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Calhoun County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Saks's 7,793 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Calhoun County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Calhoun 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 Calhoun County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Saks's 7,793 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Saks you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 7,793 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Saks-wide figureread your own land →
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