Cartersville, Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Expect cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cartersville, 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 Cartersville 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 Cartersville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cartersville — the short answer
Cartersville, Georgia: USDA zone 8a, about 249 days between hard freezes, across 18K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~249
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 18K 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 Cartersville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cartersville's 249-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cartersville
Each reading below is measured for Cartersville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCartersville runs about 249 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
MeasuredCartersville 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 Cartersville is in
Cartersville sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cartersville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bartow County.
What Grows in Cartersville
Every plant below cleared Cartersville's own zone 8a and its 249-day season. Each card opens that plant's Georgia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cartersville?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 15 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
What's on the federal record near Cartersville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cartersville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FORMER BARTOW COUNTY BLDG MAINTENANCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- 208 LEAKE STREETUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- CHARLES M GILREATHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- KROGER GA #629Underground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- PRINT SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- KNIGHT MERCHANTILE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- CSX CARTERSVILLEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- WILSON'S STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- RED CARPET INNUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- FORMER MORSE AUTOMOTIVEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- CHEVRON FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- THE FEED PLACEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cartersville'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 Cartersville.
Total Sites
425
within ~10 miles of Cartersville
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cartersville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cartersville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cartersville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Cartersville — Toxics Release Inventory (64 sites) and Superfund (6 sites). 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.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Cartersville
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 Cartersville average
Your land is one point inside Cartersville
Everything above resolves to Cartersville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 18K 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 Cartersville Average
Cartersville Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Cartersville
- ●One soil character for all of Cartersville
- ●Frost dates read at Cartersville's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cartersville's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cartersville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cartersville, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cartersville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cartersville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cartersville average
How we know this about Cartersville
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 Cartersville’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 Cartersville
When does frost risk typically end in Cartersville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cartersville typically lands around Mar 15, 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 Apr 5.
When is the first frost in Cartersville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cartersville typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 249 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cartersville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cartersville sees about 249 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Nov 5, about 214 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cartersville?
The federal record around Cartersville is a meaningful one — 425 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (271), 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 Cartersville?
From about Oct 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 Nov 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cartersville's scale — its 8a band and its 249-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cartersville'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 Cartersville’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Cartersville's own scale — its own ~249-day season between 28°F freezes, the 18,369 acres it covers and 425 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cartersville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cartersville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 15 and Nov 19 and the ~249-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 425 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cartersville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cartersville's boundary and the 18,369 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~249-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cartersville's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cartersville's 18,369 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bartow County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bartow County
- The growing challenges every Georgia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Georgia
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Bartow County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cartersville's 18,369 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cartersville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 18,369 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 Cartersville-wide figureread your own land →
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