Tarpon Springs, Florida, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Crops well matched to these conditions include artichoke, meyer lemon, california poppy, and cabbage — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Tarpon Springs, 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 Tarpon Springs 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 Tarpon Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Tarpon Springs — the short answer
Tarpon Springs, Florida: USDA zone 10a, no 28°F killing freeze on record — the season is year-round, across 6K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 10a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Killing freeze
- None on record
- NOAA RCC ACIS 1991–2020, this town’s own record
- City area
- 6K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. The year-round finding is measured — a 30-year record with no 28°F killing freeze in it — never inferred from missing dates.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 10a is Tarpon Springs's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Tarpon Springs's no killing freeze on record, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Tarpon Springs
Each reading below is measured for Tarpon Springs itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Winter hardiness
MeasuredTarpon Springs sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a.
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 Tarpon Springs is in
Tarpon Springs sits in the Southern Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Tarpon Springs's own centroid rather than borrowed from Pinellas County.
What Grows in Tarpon Springs
Every plant below cleared Tarpon Springs's own zone 10a. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
What's on the federal record near Tarpon Springs
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Tarpon Springs. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- TARPON SPRINGS HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1700 ft
- SPEEDWAY #6552Underground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- PINELLAS CNTY-PARK DEPT-HOWARD PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- PINELLAS CNTY SCHOOL BD-COUNTRYSIDEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- STAMAS YACHT INC.Brownfields · 1.0 mi
- STAMAS YACHT INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 1.0 mi
- DOLPHIN CURIO SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- F & Y INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- SOUTHDOWN INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- FAST EDDIE'S MARINAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- TURTLE COVE MARINAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- PORT TARPON MARINA ASSOCIATESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Tarpon Springs'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 Tarpon Springs.
Total Sites
1,058
within ~10 miles of Tarpon Springs
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
5 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Tarpon Springs
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Tarpon Springs
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Tarpon Springs, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 306 sites within ~10 miles of Tarpon Springs. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Tarpon Springs
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 Tarpon Springs average
Your land is one point inside Tarpon Springs
Everything above resolves to Tarpon Springs 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 Tarpon Springs Average
Tarpon Springs Average
- ●USDA Zones 10a, averaged across Tarpon Springs
- ●One soil character for all of Tarpon Springs
- ●State-average frost dates
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Tarpon Springs's 10a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Tarpon Springs
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Tarpon Springs, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Tarpon Springs averages can't show:
We read public map data around Tarpon Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Tarpon Springs average
How we know this about Tarpon Springs
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, with the labelled statewide window where none resolves; 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 Tarpon Springs
Is it too late to plant in Tarpon Springs?
No — Tarpon Springs has no 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record, so the growing season is year-round and there is no last-frost date to wait for. Planting is paced by rainfall, heat and daylength instead of by frost: start heat-lovers any month, and time cool-season crops (lettuce, brassicas, peas) for the cooler, wetter half of the year or for higher ground. Succession sowing every few weeks works all year, so the limit is what you can keep watered and harvested, not the calendar.
When does frost risk typically end in Tarpon Springs?
It doesn't — Tarpon Springs records no 28°F killing freeze at all across the 1991–2020 station record, so there is no spring frost date to plant after. Cold still matters with elevation: the higher you garden, the cooler the nights, and a few tropical crops sulk below about 60°F even where they never freeze.
How long is the growing season in Tarpon Springs?
Year-round — the 1991–2020 station record for Tarpon Springs contains no 28°F killing freeze, so there is no season to measure between freezes. What paces planting instead is heat, rainfall and daylength: the hottest, wettest stretch is the hard part for cool-season crops, not winter. Elevation is the one real exception — the higher you garden, the colder the nights get.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Tarpon Springs?
The federal record around Tarpon Springs is a meaningful one — 1,058 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (415), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.3 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.
Everything above is measured at Tarpon Springs's scale — its 10a band and its no killing freeze on record. Your yard writes its own version of Tarpon Springs'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 Tarpon Springs’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Tarpon Springs's own scale — the 5,926 acres it covers and 1,058 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Tarpon Springs's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10aUSDA PHZM 2023
- No 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record covering Tarpon Springs — a year-round growing seasonNOAA Regional Climate Centers ACIS, 1991-2020
- 1,058 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Tarpon Springs, the closest Brownfields record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Tarpon Springs's boundary and the 5,926 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear Tarpon Springs's hardiness zoneGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Tarpon Springs's own centroid, the Southern Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Tarpon Springs's 5,926 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Pinellas County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Pinellas 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 Pinellas County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Tarpon Springs's 5,926 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Tarpon Springs you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,926 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.3 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 Tarpon Springs-wide figureread your own land →
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