Meriwether County, in 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.
Meriwether County lies within the Piedmont — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Meriwether County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Meriwether 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 Meriwether County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Meriwether County — the short answer
Meriwether County, Georgia: USDA zone 8a, about 252 days between hard freezes, across 321K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~252
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 321K 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 8a is Meriwether County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Meriwether County's 252-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Meriwether County
Across a year, Meriwether County accumulates about 4,910 growing degree days above 50°F, about 505 fewer than the middle Georgia county — ahead of 55 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 1,372 hours below 45°F, 236 more 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 Meriwether County
Across Meriwether County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Madison, Cecil, and Appling are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
23%
Hydric soils
2%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Meriwether County
The USDA soil survey maps 83% of Meriwether County as well drained — but another 16% drains differently: 13% somewhat poorly drained, 2% poorly drained.
Madison is the most extensive named soil at 23% of mapped acres, then Cecil (17%) and Appling (13%).
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 Meriwether County
Each reading below is measured for Meriwether 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 Meriwether County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Meriwether County runs about pH 5.5, 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
MeasuredMeriwether County runs about 252 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
MeasuredMeriwether County 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 Meriwether County is in
Meriwether County sits in the Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Meriwether County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Meriwether County's own USDA zone 8a and its own 252-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 Meriwether County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. 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 22 — 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 gets applied to farmland in Meriwether County
USGS estimates 4,208 lb of 2,4-d on Meriwether County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (1,680 lb) and Glyphosate (604 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 Meriwether County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Meriwether County — 165 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Meriwether County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Meriwether County
Closest first, across Meriwether County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- GA FCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- 08Y006Nitrate · 2.0 mi
- MEDICAL HEALTH SERVICESUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- LANIER CLOTHES FACILITYBrownfields · 2.3 mi
- DOT #10391Underground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- JP GREENVILLEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- ABB GROUP INC/GREENVILLE FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- GREENVILLE BUS BARNUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- FORMER FLOURNOY BPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- GREENVILLE HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- ROBERTS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- GREENVILLE KWIK STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Meriwether 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 Meriwether County.
Total Sites
165
across Meriwether County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Meriwether County
Severity Distribution
across Meriwether County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Meriwether County, two things run higher than the national average across Meriwether County — Toxics Release Inventory (13 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (128 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Meriwether 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 Meriwether County average
Your land is one point inside Meriwether County
Everything above resolves to Meriwether County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 321K 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 Meriwether County Average
Meriwether County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Meriwether County
- ●One soil character for all of Meriwether County
- ●Frost dates read at Meriwether County's scale: Mar 15 to Nov 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Meriwether County's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Meriwether County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Meriwether County, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Meriwether County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Meriwether County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Meriwether County average
How we know this about Meriwether 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 Meriwether County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Meriwether County
When does frost risk typically end in Meriwether County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Meriwether County 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.
How long is the growing season in Meriwether County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Meriwether County sees about 252 frost-free days — roughly Mar 15 through Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 5 to Nov 8, about 217 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Meriwether County?
The federal record around Meriwether County shows 165 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (128), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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.
Everything above is measured at Meriwether County's scale — its 8a band and its 252-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Meriwether 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 Meriwether County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Meriwether County's own scale — its own ~252-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 165 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Meriwether County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Meriwether County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~252-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Meriwether CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 165 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Meriwether County's boundary and the 320,580 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~252-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Meriwether County sitting wholly inside the PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Meriwether 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 Meriwether County — the ~252 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 Meriwether County's 320,580 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 165 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 Meriwether Countyread your own land →