Clinch County, in Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
The conditions favor artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Clinch County lies within the Deep South Georgia / Wiregrass — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Clinch County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Clinch County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Clinch County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Clinch County — the short answer
Clinch County, Georgia: USDA zone 9a, about 291 days between hard freezes, across 522K acres.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~291
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 522K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 9a is Clinch County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Clinch County's 291-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Clinch County
Across a year, Clinch County accumulates about 6,313 growing degree days above 50°F, about 898 more than the middle Georgia county — ahead of 146 of Georgia’s 159 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Winter banks about 599 hours below 45°F, 537 fewer than the Georgia middle of 1,136. Chill is what tells a fruit tree its dormancy is over, and it is set by climate rather than by anything you can build.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Clinch County
Across Clinch County, the ground is predominantly Spodosols, where Surrency, Pelham, and Olustee are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a fine sand surface. Topsoil pH runs about 4.6–4.7, very strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Spodosols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Hydric soils
96%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Clinch County
The USDA soil survey maps 63% of Clinch County as poorly drained — but another 37% drains differently: 32% very poorly drained, 4% somewhat poorly drained.
Surrency is the most extensive named soil at 28% of mapped acres, then Pelham (11%) and Olustee (5%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Clinch County
Each reading below is measured for Clinch County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Clinch County are poorly drained, in hydrologic group C/D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Clinch County runs about pH 4.6–4.7, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredClinch County runs about 291 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredClinch County 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 Clinch County is in
Clinch County sits in the Southern Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Clinch County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Clinch County's own USDA zone 9a and its own 291-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Georgia profile.
Is it too late to plant in Clinch County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 14 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 2 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the calendar nearly circles: cool-season crops take the winter shift, and the next window is always close.
What gets applied to farmland in Clinch County
USGS estimates 2,306 lb of Glyphosate on Clinch County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (995 lb) and 2,4-d (569 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Clinch County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Clinch County — 83 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Clinch County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Clinch County
Closest first, across Clinch County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 24F001Nitrate · 2.1 mi
- DICKERSON POST TREATINGSuperfund · 5.2 mi
- GA FCUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- CLINCH CO MAINT SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- AT&TUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- GA DOT #10413/CLINCH CO MAINT HQUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- GA FC/CLINCH CO UNITUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- HOMERVILLE BMB & GNRYSuperfund · 7.6 mi
- CLINCH CO SCHOOL BUS SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.8 mi
- GRIFFIS 66Underground Storage Tanks · 8.3 mi
- HOMERVILLE AUTO & TIREUnderground Storage Tanks · 8.3 mi
- FLASH FOODS #170Underground Storage Tanks · 8.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Clinch County'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 Clinch County.
Total Sites
83
across Clinch County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Clinch County
Severity Distribution
across Clinch County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Clinch County, two things run higher than the national average across Clinch County — Superfund (6 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (60 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Clinch County
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 Clinch County average
Your land is one point inside Clinch County
Everything above resolves to Clinch County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 522K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Clinch County Average
Clinch County Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Clinch County
- ●One soil character for all of Clinch County
- ●Frost dates read at Clinch County's scale: Feb 14 to Dec 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Clinch County's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Clinch County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Clinch County, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Clinch County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Clinch County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Clinch County average
How we know this about Clinch County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Clinch County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Clinch County
When does frost risk typically end in Clinch County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Clinch County typically lands around Feb 14, 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 7.
How long is the growing season in Clinch County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Clinch County sees about 291 frost-free days — roughly Feb 14 through Dec 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 7 to Nov 18, about 256 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Clinch County?
The federal record around Clinch County is a meaningful one — 83 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (60), the nearest Nitrate record about 2.1 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 Clinch County's scale — its 9a band and its 291-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Clinch County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Georgia's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Clinch County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Clinch County's own scale — its own ~291-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 83 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Clinch County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Clinch County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~291-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Clinch CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 83 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 2.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Clinch County's boundary and the 521,600 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~291-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Clinch County sitting wholly inside the Southern Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Clinch County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Georgia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Georgia
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Clinch County — the ~291 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Clinch County's 521,600 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 83 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Clinch Countyread your own land →