Malvern, Arkansas, 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.
The conditions favor cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Malvern, 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 Malvern 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 Malvern — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Malvern — the short answer
Malvern, Arkansas: USDA zone 8a, about 258 days between hard freezes, across 6K 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 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~258
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 6K 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 Malvern's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Malvern's 258-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Malvern
Each reading below is measured for Malvern itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMalvern runs about 258 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
MeasuredMalvern 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 Malvern is in
Malvern sits in the South Central Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Malvern's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Hot Spring County is mostly Ouachita Mountains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Malvern
Every plant below cleared Malvern's own zone 8a and its 258-day season. Each card opens that plant's Arkansas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Malvern?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 20 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
What's on the federal record near Malvern
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Malvern. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JONES MILLS PLANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- DON'S BAIT SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- MCHENRY PLBG COMPANY, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- C.A.D.C. SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- QUIK WAY LUBE & TIRE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- GORDY'S BODY SHOP, INC.Brownfields · 1400 ft
- LUCKY LAYLAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- PACTIV CORPORATIONBrownfields · 1600 ft
- OUACHITA TECHNICAL COLLEGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- OUACHITA TECHNICAL COLLEGEBrownfields · 1600 ft
- DLM, DIVISION OF SYSTEMS, LLCToxics Release Inventory · 2200 ft
- DLM, DIVISION OF SYSTEMS, LLCBrownfields · 2200 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Malvern'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 Malvern.
Total Sites
213
within ~10 miles of Malvern
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Malvern
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Malvern
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Malvern, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Malvern — PFAS (3 sites) and Superfund (4 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Malvern
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 Malvern average
Your land is one point inside Malvern
Everything above resolves to Malvern as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 6K 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 Malvern Average
Malvern Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Malvern
- ●One soil character for all of Malvern
- ●Frost dates read at Malvern's scale: Mar 7 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Malvern's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Malvern
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Malvern, Arkansas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Malvern averages can't show:
We read public map data around Malvern — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Malvern average
How we know this about Malvern
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 Malvern’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 Malvern
When does frost risk typically end in Malvern?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Malvern 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 Malvern?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Malvern typically arrives around Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 6, so the watching starts about Oct 21 — about 258 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Malvern?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Malvern sees about 258 frost-free days — roughly Mar 7 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 28 to Nov 6, about 223 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Malvern?
The federal record around Malvern is a meaningful one — 213 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (107), 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 Malvern?
From about Oct 21 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Malvern's scale — its 8a band and its 258-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Malvern'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 Malvern’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Malvern's own scale — its own ~258-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,195 acres it covers and 213 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Malvern's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Malvern's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 7 and Nov 20 and the ~258-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 213 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Malvern, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Malvern's boundary and the 6,195 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~258-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Malvern sits in the South Central Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Malvern's 6,195 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hot Spring County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hot Spring 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 Hot Spring County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Malvern's 6,195 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Malvern you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,195 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 Malvern-wide figureread your own land →
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