Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Fort Oglethorpe, 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 Fort Oglethorpe 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 Fort Oglethorpe — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Fort Oglethorpe — the short answer
Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia: USDA zone 8a, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 9K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 9K 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 Fort Oglethorpe's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fort Oglethorpe's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Fort Oglethorpe
Each reading below is measured for Fort Oglethorpe itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredFort Oglethorpe runs about 243 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
MeasuredFort Oglethorpe 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 Fort Oglethorpe is in
Fort Oglethorpe sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Fort Oglethorpe's own centroid rather than borrowed from Catoosa County.
What Grows in Fort Oglethorpe
Every plant below cleared Fort Oglethorpe's own zone 8a and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's Georgia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Fort Oglethorpe?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 16; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 14 — 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.
Documented around Fort Oglethorpe
Survey cells within 31 miles of Fort Oglethorpe checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 100 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Fort Oglethorpe
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Fort Oglethorpe. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FORT OGLETHORPEPFAS · 1400 ft
- EAST COAST TELECOMBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- CITY OF FT OGLETHORPEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- DANUBE CARPET MILLSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- TRACTOR SUPPLY COMPANY #553Brownfields · 1.3 mi
- MEGA STAR FOOD MART #6Underground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- HOME DEPOT STORE #1769Brownfields · 1.3 mi
- SUNSET MARKET #2Underground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- ULTRA PRO AUTO WASHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- LOWE'S OF FT. OGLETHORPE GA #485Brownfields · 1.4 mi
- WALGREENS 7567Brownfields · 1.4 mi
- CATOOSA COUNTY/BATTLEFIELD SCHOOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fort Oglethorpe'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 Fort Oglethorpe.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Fort Oglethorpe
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Fort Oglethorpe
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Fort Oglethorpe, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Fort Oglethorpe — Superfund (28 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (110 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Fort Oglethorpe
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 Fort Oglethorpe average
Your land is one point inside Fort Oglethorpe
Everything above resolves to Fort Oglethorpe as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 9K 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 Fort Oglethorpe Average
Fort Oglethorpe Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Fort Oglethorpe
- ●One soil character for all of Fort Oglethorpe
- ●Frost dates read at Fort Oglethorpe's scale: Mar 16 to Nov 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fort Oglethorpe's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Fort Oglethorpe
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fort Oglethorpe averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fort Oglethorpe — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fort Oglethorpe average
How we know this about Fort Oglethorpe
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 Fort Oglethorpe’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 Fort Oglethorpe
When does frost risk typically end in Fort Oglethorpe?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Oglethorpe typically lands around Mar 16, 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 6.
When is the first frost in Fort Oglethorpe?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Fort Oglethorpe typically arrives around Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 31, so the watching starts about Oct 15 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Fort Oglethorpe?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Fort Oglethorpe sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 16 through Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 6 to Oct 31, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Fort Oglethorpe?
The federal record around Fort Oglethorpe runs heavier than most — 1,237 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (872), the nearest PFAS record about 0.3 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Fort Oglethorpe?
From about Oct 15 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 14 (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 14. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Fort Oglethorpe's scale — its 8a band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Fort Oglethorpe'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 Fort Oglethorpe’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Fort Oglethorpe's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 8,895 acres it covers and 1,237 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fort Oglethorpe's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Fort Oglethorpe's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 16 and Nov 14 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,237 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Fort Oglethorpe, the closest PFAS record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Fort Oglethorpe's boundary and the 8,895 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Fort Oglethorpe's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Fort Oglethorpe checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Fort Oglethorpe's 8,895 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Catoosa County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Catoosa 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 Catoosa County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Fort Oglethorpe's 8,895 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Fort Oglethorpe you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 8,895 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest PFAS 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 Fort Oglethorpe-wide figureread your own land →
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