Taliaferro County, in Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Taliaferro 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
Taliaferro County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Taliaferro County — the short answer
Taliaferro County, Georgia: USDA zone 8b, about 264 days between hard freezes, across 125K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~264
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 125K 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 8b is Taliaferro County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Taliaferro County's 264-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Taliaferro County
Across a year, Taliaferro County accumulates about 5,011 growing degree days above 50°F, about 404 fewer than the middle Georgia county — ahead of 61 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 1,394 hours below 45°F, 258 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 Taliaferro County
Across Taliaferro County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Cataula, Georgeville, and Lloyd are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.1–5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
23%
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Taliaferro County
The USDA soil survey maps 50% of Taliaferro County as moderately well drained — but another 50% drains differently: 33% well drained, 16% somewhat poorly drained.
Cataula is the most extensive named soil at 20% of mapped acres, then Georgeville (13%) and Lloyd (12%).
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 Taliaferro County
Each reading below is measured for Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group D — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Taliaferro County runs about pH 5.1–5.5, 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
MeasuredTaliaferro County runs about 264 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
MeasuredTaliaferro County sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Taliaferro County is in
Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Taliaferro County's own USDA zone 8b and its own 264-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 Taliaferro County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 27 — 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 Taliaferro County
USGS estimates 1,309 lb of 2,4-d on Taliaferro County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Malathion (556 lb) and Triclopyr (406 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 Taliaferro County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Taliaferro County — 27 documented sites across 4 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Taliaferro County is light. Growing food here starts from a strong position — a quick pass over the map tells you whether any recorded site sits near your land, and if one does, that's information to plant with, not a reason to stop.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Taliaferro County
Closest first, across Taliaferro County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SENIOR CITIZEN BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- 22CC04Nitrate · 1.3 mi
- A H STEPHENS STATE PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- TALIAFERRO CO UNIT GA FORESTRY CUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- GA DOT #10255 TALIAFERRO CO MAINUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- A&P STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- CRAWFORDVILLE MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- ANSLEY AMOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- TALIAFERRO COUNTY RD DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- CHAPMANS AMOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- GA DOT #10287 OLD TALIAFERRO COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- C&M QUICK STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County.
Total Sites
27
across Taliaferro County
Risk Level
Low
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Taliaferro County
Severity Distribution
across Taliaferro County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Taliaferro County, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 18 sites across Taliaferro County. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County average
Your land is one point inside Taliaferro County
Everything above resolves to Taliaferro County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 125K 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 Taliaferro County Average
Taliaferro County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Taliaferro County
- ●One soil character for all of Taliaferro County
- ●Frost dates read at Taliaferro County's scale: Mar 8 to Nov 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Taliaferro County's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Taliaferro County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Taliaferro County, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Taliaferro County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Taliaferro County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Taliaferro County average
How we know this about Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Taliaferro County
When does frost risk typically end in Taliaferro County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Taliaferro County typically lands around Mar 8, 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 29.
How long is the growing season in Taliaferro County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Taliaferro County sees about 264 frost-free days — roughly Mar 8 through Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 29 to Nov 13, about 229 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Taliaferro County?
The federal record around Taliaferro County is light — 27 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (18), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
Everything above is measured at Taliaferro County's scale — its 8b band and its 264-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Taliaferro County's own scale — its own ~264-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 27 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Taliaferro County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Taliaferro County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~264-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Taliaferro CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 27 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Taliaferro County's boundary and the 124,548 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~264-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Taliaferro County sitting wholly inside the PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Taliaferro 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 Taliaferro County — the ~264 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 Taliaferro County's 124,548 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 27 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 Taliaferro Countyread your own land →