Blytheville, Arkansas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
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 Blytheville, 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 Blytheville 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 Blytheville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Blytheville — the short answer
Blytheville, Arkansas: USDA zone 8a, about 263 days between hard freezes, across 13K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~263
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 13K 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 Blytheville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Blytheville's 263-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Blytheville
Each reading below is measured for Blytheville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBlytheville runs about 263 days between hard freezes — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBlytheville 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 Blytheville is in
Blytheville sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Blytheville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Mississippi County.
What Grows in Blytheville
Every plant below cleared Blytheville's own zone 8a and its 263-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arkansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Blytheville?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 25 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With almost year-round growing weather, timing is about heat and rainfall more than frost — some bench is always in play.
What's on the federal record near Blytheville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Blytheville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- GARYS FOOD MART#1Underground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- MISSISSIPPI CTY ELECTRIC COOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- SIXTY-ONE IMPLEMENT & MOTOR COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- KROGER FUEL CENTER V-465Underground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- HOPPER'S EXXONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- BRANSCUM MOVING & STORAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- LITTRELL FORD L-MUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- PLAZA TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- JAMES PARRISH GULF SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- MONTGOMERY WARD AUTO CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- BLYTHEVILLE FORD LINCOLN MERCURY INCBrownfields · 1700 ft
- BLYTHEVILLE STEAM LAUNDRY & CLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Blytheville'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 Blytheville.
Total Sites
278
within ~10 miles of Blytheville
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Blytheville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Blytheville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Blytheville, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 37 sites within ~10 miles of Blytheville. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Blytheville
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 Blytheville average
Your land is one point inside Blytheville
Everything above resolves to Blytheville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 13K 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 Blytheville Average
Blytheville Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Blytheville
- ●One soil character for all of Blytheville
- ●Frost dates read at Blytheville's scale: Mar 7 to Nov 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Blytheville's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Blytheville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Blytheville, Arkansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Blytheville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Blytheville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Blytheville average
How we know this about Blytheville
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 Blytheville’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 Blytheville
When does frost risk typically end in Blytheville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Blytheville typically lands around Mar 7, 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 Mar 28.
When is the first frost in Blytheville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Blytheville typically arrives around Nov 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 11, so the watching starts about Oct 26 — about 263 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Blytheville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Blytheville sees about 263 frost-free days — roughly Mar 7 through Nov 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 28 to Nov 11, about 228 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Blytheville?
The federal record around Blytheville is a meaningful one — 278 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (168), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Blytheville?
From about Oct 26 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 25 (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 25. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Blytheville's scale — its 8a band and its 263-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Blytheville'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 Blytheville’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Blytheville's own scale — its own ~263-day season between 28°F freezes, the 13,272 acres it covers and 278 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Blytheville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Blytheville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 7 and Nov 25 and the ~263-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 278 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Blytheville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Blytheville's boundary and the 13,272 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~263-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Blytheville's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Blytheville's 13,272 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Mississippi County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Mississippi 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 Mississippi County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Blytheville's 13,272 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Blytheville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 13,272 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Blytheville-wide figureread your own land →
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