Amity, Arkansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Amity, 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 Amity 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 Amity — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Amity — the short answer
Amity, Arkansas: USDA zone 8a, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 2K 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 Amity's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Amity's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Amity
Each reading below is measured for Amity itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredAmity 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
MeasuredAmity 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 Amity is in
Amity sits in the Ouachita Mountains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Amity's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Clark County is mostly South Central Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Amity
Every plant below cleared Amity's own zone 8a and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arkansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Amity?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
What's on the federal record near Amity
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Amity. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AMITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- ASHLEY, DREW SR.Underground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- AMITY, CITY OFUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- AMITY STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- AMITY SCHOOL DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- CARLEE""S CORNERUnderground Storage Tanks · 550 ft
- VARNER'S STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- ALTON BEAN TRUCKING INCBrownfields · 850 ft
- VACANT LOT NEXT TO FIRE DEPT.Underground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- JEREMY'S SPORT STOP INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- 05S23W33ACA1Nitrate · 2600 ft
- BARKSDALE LUMBER COMPANY, INCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Amity'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 Amity.
Total Sites
104
within ~10 miles of Amity
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Amity
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Amity
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Amity, Mining runs higher than the national average — 27 sites within ~10 miles of Amity. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Amity
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 Amity average
Your land is one point inside Amity
Everything above resolves to Amity as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 city 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 Amity Average
Amity Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Amity
- ●One soil character for all of Amity
- ●Frost dates read at Amity's scale: Mar 17 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Amity's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Amity
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Amity, Arkansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Amity averages can't show:
We read public map data around Amity — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Amity average
How we know this about Amity
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Amity’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Amity
When does frost risk typically end in Amity?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Amity typically lands around Mar 17, 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 7.
When is the first frost in Amity?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Amity typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Amity?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Amity sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 17 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 7 to Nov 1, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Amity?
The federal record around Amity runs heavier than most — 104 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (56), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Amity?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Amity's scale — its 8a band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Amity'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 Amity’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Amity's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,054 acres it covers and 104 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Amity's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Amity's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 17 and Nov 15 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 104 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Amity, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Amity's boundary and the 2,054 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Amity sits in the Ouachita Mountains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Amity's 2,054 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Clark County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Clark County
- The growing challenges every Arkansas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Arkansas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Clark County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Amity's 2,054 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Amity you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,054 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Amity-wide figureread your own land →