Brooker, Florida, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Reliable performers under these conditions include artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Brooker, 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 Brooker 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 Brooker — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Brooker — the short answer
Brooker, Florida: USDA zone 9a, about 306 days between hard freezes, across 337 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 7
- Bradford County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 10
- Bradford County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~306
- Bradford County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 337 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 Bradford County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Brooker's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Brooker's 306-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Brooker
Each reading below is measured for Brooker itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsBrooker runs about 306 days between hard freezes (read from Bradford County, the closest normal to Brooker) — 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
MeasuredBrooker sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a.
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 Brooker is in
Brooker sits in the Southern Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Brooker's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bradford County.
What Grows in Brooker
Every plant below cleared Brooker's own zone 9a and its 306-day season. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Brooker?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 10; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 10 — 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 Brooker
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Brooker. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- VALLEY VIEW THREEUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- THE PANTRY #2548 DBA/KANGAROO EXPRESS #2548Underground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- GREEN'S GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- WILLIAMSON PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- FLORIDA GAS TRANSMISSION COMPANYBrownfields · 2.5 mi
- FL GAS TRANSMISSION CO-STAT #16Underground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
- GAINSVILLE EMPOWERMENT CTRUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- GAINESVILLE CITY-MURPHREE WTR PLTUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- JESSE A THOMAS FARMSUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- CONTAINER CORP OF AMERICAUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- COLSON MARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.0 mi
- THOMAS PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Brooker'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 Brooker.
Total Sites
95
within ~10 miles of Brooker
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Brooker
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Brooker
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Brooker
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 Brooker average
Your land is one point inside Brooker
Everything above resolves to Brooker as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 337 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Bradford 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 Brooker Average
Brooker Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Brooker
- ●One soil character for all of Brooker
- ●Frost dates read at Brooker's scale: Feb 7 to Dec 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Brooker's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Brooker
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Brooker, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Brooker averages can't show:
We read public map data around Brooker — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Brooker average
How we know this about Brooker
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 Bradford 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 Brooker
When does frost risk typically end in Brooker?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Brooker typically lands around Feb 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 Feb 28.
When is the first frost in Brooker?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Brooker typically arrives around Dec 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 26, so the watching starts about Nov 10 — about 306 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Brooker?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Brooker sees about 306 frost-free days — roughly Feb 7 through Dec 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 28 to Nov 26, about 271 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Brooker?
The federal record around Brooker shows 95 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (57), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Brooker?
From about Nov 10 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 Dec 10 (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 Dec 10. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Brooker's scale — its 9a band and its 306-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Brooker'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 Brooker’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Brooker's own scale — the 337 acres it covers and 95 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Brooker's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 95 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Brooker, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Brooker's boundary and the 337 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~306-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Brooker's own centroid, the Southern Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Brooker has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Bradford County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Brooker's 337 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bradford County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bradford County
- The growing challenges every Florida grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Florida
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Bradford County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Brooker's 337 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Brooker you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 337 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 Brooker-wide figureread your own land →
More in Florida
Wider growing context
What grows across FloridaBrooker sits outside our named growing regions, so Florida as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides