Fleming County, in Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Fleming County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Fleming 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 Fleming County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Fleming County — the short answer
Fleming County, Kentucky: USDA zone 6b, about 221 days between hard freezes, across 223K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~221
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 223K 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 6b is Fleming County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fleming County's 221-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Fleming County
Across a year, Fleming County accumulates about 3,496 growing degree days above 50°F, about 164 fewer than the middle Kentucky county — ahead of 15 of Kentucky’s 120 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.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Fleming County
Across Fleming County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Lowell, Beasley, and Eden are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.3–6.5, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
19%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Fleming County
The USDA soil survey maps 89% of Fleming County as well drained — but another 11% drains differently: 8% moderately well drained, 2% somewhat poorly drained.
Lowell is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Beasley (11%) and Eden (10%).
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 Fleming County
Each reading below is measured for Fleming 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 Fleming County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — 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 Fleming County runs about pH 5.3–6.5, 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
MeasuredFleming County runs about 221 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
MeasuredFleming County sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Fleming County is in
Fleming County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Interior Plateau (66%) and Western Allegheny Plateau (34%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Fleming County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Fleming County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 221-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 Kentucky profile.
Is it too late to plant in Fleming 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 Mar 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 1 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Fleming County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Fleming County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 65 miles off. What to watch for.
What gets applied to farmland in Fleming County
USGS estimates 18,195 lb of Glyphosate on Fleming County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (13,301 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (4,439 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 Fleming County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Fleming County — 159 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Fleming County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Fleming County
Closest first, across Fleming County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Jim & Chris Gibson GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- Gibson PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- Eldridge Bros IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- Gasoline Alley #10Underground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- Jimi Daves PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- HOUSING INNOVATIONS INCToxics Release Inventory · 2.8 mi
- FLEMINGSBURG UTILITY SYSTEMPFAS · 2.9 mi
- Fleming Co Road DeptUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- Flemingsburg WWTPUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- NINE WEST GROUP INCToxics Release Inventory · 3.6 mi
- Tilton Corner StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- M & S Service Ashland OilUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fleming 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 Fleming County.
Sources Checked
across Fleming County
Severity Distribution
across Fleming County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Fleming County, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 62 sites across Fleming County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Fleming 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 Fleming County average
Your land is one point inside Fleming County
Everything above resolves to Fleming County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 223K 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 Fleming County Average
Fleming County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Fleming County
- ●One soil character for all of Fleming County
- ●Frost dates read at Fleming County's scale: Apr 1 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fleming County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Fleming County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fleming County, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fleming County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fleming County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fleming County average
How we know this about Fleming 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 Fleming County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Fleming County
When does frost risk typically end in Fleming County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Fleming County typically lands around Apr 1, 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 22.
How long is the growing season in Fleming County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Fleming County sees about 221 frost-free days — roughly Apr 1 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 22 to Oct 25, about 186 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Fleming County?
The federal record around Fleming County is a meaningful one — 159 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (89), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 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.
Everything above is measured at Fleming County's scale — its 6b band and its 221-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Fleming 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 Kentucky's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Fleming County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Fleming County's own scale — its own ~221-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 159 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fleming County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Fleming County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~221-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Fleming CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 159 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Fleming County's boundary and the 223,150 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~221-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Fleming County spans, Interior Plateau the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Fleming County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Kentucky grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kentucky
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Fleming County — the ~221 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 Fleming County's 223,150 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 159 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 Fleming Countyread your own land →