Screven, Georgia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Crops well matched to these conditions include artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Screven, 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 Screven 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 Screven — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Screven — the short answer
Screven, Georgia: USDA zone 9a, about 287 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 20
- Wayne County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 4
- Wayne County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~287
- Wayne County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 1K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Wayne County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Screven's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Screven's 287-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Screven
Each reading below is measured for Screven itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsScreven runs about 287 days between hard freezes (read from Wayne County, the closest normal to Screven) — 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
MeasuredScreven 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 Screven is in
Screven sits in the Southern Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Screven's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wayne County.
What Grows in Screven
Every plant below cleared Screven's own zone 9a and its 287-day season. Each card opens that plant's Georgia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Screven?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With almost year-round growing weather, timing is about heat and rainfall more than frost — some bench is always in play.
What's on the federal record near Screven
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Screven. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SCREVEN H2O2 DERAILMENTSuperfund · 550 ft
- FRIENDLY EXPRESS #87Underground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- CITY OF SCREVENUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- ERVINS EXXONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- DENISON SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- ALLTELUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- BOYETTE CAMPER SALESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SCREVEN DISCOUNT OUTLETUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- F&M BURCH FARMSUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- PATTERSON LOCOMOTIVE REPAIRBrownfields · 5.1 mi
- THORNTON GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.6 mi
- 29L005Nitrate · 5.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Screven'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 Screven.
Total Sites
55
within ~10 miles of Screven
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Screven
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Screven
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Screven, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Screven — PFAS (3 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (4 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Screven
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 Screven average
Your land is one point inside Screven
Everything above resolves to Screven as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 1K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Wayne County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’s own centroid. 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 Screven Average
Screven Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Screven
- ●One soil character for all of Screven
- ●Frost dates read at Screven's scale: Feb 20 to Dec 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Screven's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Screven
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Screven, Georgia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Screven averages can't show:
We read public map data around Screven — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Screven average
How we know this about Screven
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 Wayne County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 Screven
When does frost risk typically end in Screven?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Screven typically lands around Feb 20, 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 13.
When is the first frost in Screven?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Screven typically arrives around Dec 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 20, so the watching starts about Nov 4 — about 287 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Screven?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Screven sees about 287 frost-free days — roughly Feb 20 through Dec 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 13 to Nov 20, about 252 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Screven?
The federal record around Screven is a meaningful one — 55 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (34), the nearest Superfund record about 0.1 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Screven?
From about Nov 4 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 Dec 4 (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 Dec 4. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Screven's scale — its 9a band and its 287-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Screven'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 Screven’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Screven's own scale — the 1,380 acres it covers and 55 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Screven's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 55 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Screven, the closest Superfund record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Screven's boundary and the 1,380 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~287-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Screven's own centroid, the Southern Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Screven has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Wayne County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Screven's 1,380 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wayne County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wayne 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 Wayne County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Screven's 1,380 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Screven you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,380 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund record about 0.1 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 Screven-wide figureread your own land →
More in Georgia
Growing region