Palm Valley, Florida, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Among the crops suited to this profile: okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Palm Valley, 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 Palm Valley 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 Palm Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Palm Valley — the short answer
Palm Valley, Florida: USDA zone 9b, about 329 days between hard freezes, across 8K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 25
- St. Johns County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 20
- St. Johns County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~329
- St. Johns County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 8K 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 St. Johns County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9b is Palm Valley's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Palm Valley's 329-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Palm Valley
Each reading below is measured for Palm Valley itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsPalm Valley runs about 329 days between hard freezes (read from St. Johns County, the closest normal to Palm Valley) — 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
MeasuredPalm Valley sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b.
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 Palm Valley is in
Palm Valley sits in the Southern Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Palm Valley's own centroid rather than borrowed from St. Johns County.
What Grows in Palm Valley
Every plant below cleared Palm Valley's own zone 9b and its 329-day season. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Palm Valley?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 20 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
What's on the federal record near Palm Valley
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Palm Valley. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TOURNAMENT PLAYERS CLUBBrownfields · 500 ft
- TPC-SAWGRASSUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- VICARS LANDING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- JACKSONVILLE BEACH CITY-MAINT YARDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- LIL CHAMP FOOD STORE #171Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- JIFFY LUBE #1425Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- PUBLIX SUPER MARKET #1437Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- SHELL-FIRST COAST ENERGY #1017Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- CVS PHARMACY #3631Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- FDEP DSCP SITE D392 ID#559500841Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- ST JOHNS CNTY-E M SUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- FIRST COAST COMMERCIAL REALTYBrownfields · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Palm Valley'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 Palm Valley.
Total Sites
447
within ~10 miles of Palm Valley
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Palm Valley
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Palm Valley
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Palm Valley, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Palm Valley — PFAS (6 sites) and Brownfields (224 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.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Palm Valley
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 Palm Valley average
Your land is one point inside Palm Valley
Everything above resolves to Palm Valley as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 8K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from St. Johns 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 Palm Valley Average
Palm Valley Average
- ●USDA Zones 9b, averaged across Palm Valley
- ●One soil character for all of Palm Valley
- ●Frost dates read at Palm Valley's scale: Jan 25 to Dec 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Palm Valley's 9b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Palm Valley
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Palm Valley, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Palm Valley averages can't show:
We read public map data around Palm Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Palm Valley average
How we know this about Palm Valley
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 St. Johns 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 Palm Valley
When does frost risk typically end in Palm Valley?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Palm Valley typically lands around Jan 25, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Palm Valley?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Palm Valley typically arrives around Dec 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Dec 6, so the watching starts about Nov 20 — about 329 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Palm Valley?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Palm Valley sees about 329 frost-free days — roughly Jan 25 through Dec 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 15 to Dec 6, about 294 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Palm Valley?
The federal record around Palm Valley is a meaningful one — 447 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (224), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile 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 Palm Valley?
From about Nov 20 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 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 Dec 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Palm Valley's scale — its 9b band and its 329-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Palm Valley'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 Palm Valley’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Palm Valley's own scale — the 7,805 acres it covers and 447 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Palm Valley's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 447 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Palm Valley, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Palm Valley's boundary and the 7,805 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9b and a ~329-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Palm Valley's own centroid, the Southern Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Palm Valley has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom St. Johns County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Palm Valley's 7,805 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom St. Johns County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom St. Johns 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 St. Johns County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Palm Valley's 7,805 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Palm Valley you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 7,805 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Palm Valley-wide figureread your own land →