McCaysville, Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, prickly pear, 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 McCaysville, 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 McCaysville 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 McCaysville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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McCaysville — the short answer
McCaysville, Georgia: USDA zone 7b, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 963 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 963 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 7b is McCaysville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against McCaysville's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in McCaysville
Each reading below is measured for McCaysville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMcCaysville runs about 216 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
MeasuredMcCaysville sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 McCaysville is in
McCaysville sits in the Blue Ridge — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at McCaysville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Fannin County.
What Grows in McCaysville
Every plant below cleared McCaysville's own zone 7b and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Georgia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in McCaysville?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 2 — 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 McCaysville
Survey cells within 31 miles of McCaysville checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 83 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near McCaysville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of McCaysville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MOUNTAIN EXPRESS #18Underground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- WILLIS OIL CO NORTH #2Underground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- WADE CURTIS TIRE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- PICK QUICK GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- DON'S CARWASH (FORMER)Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- O'REILLY AUTO PARTS #1406Brownfields · 1900 ft
- COPPER PANTRYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- JUDSY CONVENIENCE & CAR WASHUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Tiny Giant MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- PACKS CHEVRONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- RIVER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Central ServicesMining · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from McCaysville'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 McCaysville.
Total Sites
166
within ~10 miles of McCaysville
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of McCaysville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of McCaysville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around McCaysville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of McCaysville — Mining (36 sites) and Superfund (6 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in McCaysville
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 McCaysville average
Your land is one point inside McCaysville
Everything above resolves to McCaysville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 963 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 McCaysville Average
McCaysville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across McCaysville
- ●One soil character for all of McCaysville
- ●Frost dates read at McCaysville's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not McCaysville's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in McCaysville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in McCaysville, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that McCaysville averages can't show:
We read public map data around McCaysville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the McCaysville average
How we know this about McCaysville
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 McCaysville’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 McCaysville
When does frost risk typically end in McCaysville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in McCaysville typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
When is the first frost in McCaysville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in McCaysville typically arrives around Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 19, so the watching starts about Oct 3 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in McCaysville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, McCaysville sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Oct 19, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in McCaysville?
The federal record around McCaysville runs heavier than most — 166 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (104), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 McCaysville?
From about Oct 3 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 2 (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 2. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at McCaysville's scale — its 7b band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of McCaysville'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 McCaysville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at McCaysville's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 963 acres it covers and 166 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- McCaysville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- McCaysville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 2 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 166 documented contamination sites on the federal record near McCaysville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- McCaysville's boundary and the 963 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at McCaysville's own centroid, the Blue RidgeUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around McCaysville 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 McCaysville's 963 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Fannin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Fannin 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 Fannin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among McCaysville's 963 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of McCaysville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 963 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 McCaysville-wide figureread your own land →