White Plains, Alabama, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
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 White Plains, 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 White Plains 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 White Plains — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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White Plains — the short answer
White Plains, Alabama: USDA zone 8a, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 8K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 8K 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 White Plains's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against White Plains's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in White Plains
Each reading below is measured for White Plains itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredWhite Plains runs about 243 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
MeasuredWhite Plains 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 White Plains is in
White Plains sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at White Plains's own centroid rather than borrowed from Calhoun County.
What Grows in White Plains
Every plant below cleared White Plains's own zone 8a and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's Alabama profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in White Plains?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. 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 13 — 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 White Plains
Closest first, within ~10 miles of White Plains. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KELVIN A. HALLCAFO · 2500 ft
- STEWARDS MARKET #102Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- WHITE PLAINS HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Well JACKSONVILLE HWY 9 Calhoun Cnty ALNitrate · 1.3 mi
- DULIN FARMCAFO · 1.3 mi
- MURRAY SERVICE STATION & GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- WORTHINGTON FARMSCAFO · 2.3 mi
- KEN & AMANDA HIGHTOWER FARMCAFO · 2.8 mi
- EC & KENDALL FARMCAFO · 2.9 mi
- Well Whites Gap Church, AL93-40-W Calhoun Cnty ALNitrate · 3.2 mi
- COUNTRY MART GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- Well MURRY PROPERTY TEST WELL Calhoun Cnty ALNitrate · 3.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from White Plains'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 White Plains.
Total Sites
226
within ~10 miles of White Plains
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
9 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of White Plains
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of White Plains
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around White Plains, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of White Plains — CAFO (8 sites) and Superfund (9 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in White Plains
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 White Plains average
Your land is one point inside White Plains
Everything above resolves to White Plains as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 8K 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 White Plains Average
White Plains Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across White Plains
- ●One soil character for all of White Plains
- ●Frost dates read at White Plains's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 13
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not White Plains's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in White Plains
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in White Plains, Alabama — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that White Plains averages can't show:
We read public map data around White Plains — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the White Plains average
How we know this about White Plains
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 White Plains’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 White Plains
When does frost risk typically end in White Plains?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in White Plains 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 White Plains?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in White Plains typically arrives around Nov 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 30, so the watching starts about Oct 14 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in White Plains?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, White Plains sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Oct 30, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in White Plains?
The federal record around White Plains is a meaningful one — 226 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (116), the nearest CAFO record about 0.5 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 White Plains?
From about Oct 14 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 13 (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 13. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at White Plains's scale — its 8a band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of White Plains'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 White Plains’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at White Plains's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 8,186 acres it covers and 226 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- White Plains's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- White Plains's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 15 and Nov 13 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 226 documented contamination sites on the federal record near White Plains, the closest CAFO record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- White Plains's boundary and the 8,186 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at White Plains's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so White Plains's 8,186 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 White Plains's 8,186 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of White Plains you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 8,186 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest CAFO record about 0.5 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 White Plains-wide figureread your own land →
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