Monroe County, in Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Monroe County lies within the Pennyroyal / Pennyrile (South-Central Kentucky Karst Plateau) — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Monroe County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Monroe 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 Monroe County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Monroe County — the short answer
Monroe County, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 225 days between hard freezes, across 211K acres.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~225
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 211K 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 7a is Monroe County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Monroe County's 225-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Monroe County
Across a year, Monroe County accumulates about 4,017 growing degree days above 50°F, about 357 more than the middle Kentucky county — ahead of 90 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.
Winter banks about 2,265 hours below 45°F. 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 Monroe County
Across Monroe County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Garmon, Waynesboro, and Trimble are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a gravelly silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.0–6.5, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
17%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Monroe County
The USDA soil survey maps 92% of Monroe County as well drained — but another 7% drains differently: 5% moderately well drained, 2% somewhat poorly drained.
Garmon is the most extensive named soil at 24% of mapped acres, then Waynesboro (23%) and Trimble (23%).
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 Monroe County
Each reading below is measured for Monroe 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 Monroe County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — 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 Monroe County runs about pH 5.0–6.5, 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
MeasuredMonroe County runs about 225 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
MeasuredMonroe County sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Monroe County is in
Monroe County sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Monroe County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Monroe County's own USDA zone 7a and its own 225-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 Monroe County?
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 Feb 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 28 (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. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
What gets applied to farmland in Monroe County
USGS estimates 27,938 lb of Glyphosate on Monroe County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (20,566 lb) and Atrazine (7,875 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 Monroe County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Monroe County — 83 documented sites across 5 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 Monroe County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Monroe County
Closest first, across Monroe County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Corner ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Tompkinsville Block CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Roy Anderson Lumber CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Stephens Mfg Co IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- Copass Tire SaleUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- Main Street ChevronUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Tri Co Electric MembershipUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Smith StandardUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Monroe Feed & Farm Supply IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Emberton ChevronUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Hagans Main St ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Humes Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Monroe 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 Monroe County.
Total Sites
83
across Monroe County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Monroe County
Severity Distribution
across Monroe County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Monroe County, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 77 sites across Monroe County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around 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 Monroe 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 Monroe County average
Your land is one point inside Monroe County
Everything above resolves to Monroe County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 211K 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 Monroe County Average
Monroe County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Monroe County
- ●One soil character for all of Monroe County
- ●Frost dates read at Monroe County's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Monroe County's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Monroe County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Monroe County, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Monroe County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Monroe County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Monroe County average
How we know this about Monroe 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 Monroe County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Monroe County
When does frost risk typically end in Monroe County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Monroe County typically lands around Mar 28, 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 18.
How long is the growing season in Monroe County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Monroe County sees about 225 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Oct 25, about 190 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Monroe County?
The federal record around Monroe County shows 83 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (77), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Monroe County's scale — its 7a band and its 225-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Monroe 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 Monroe County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Monroe County's own scale — its own ~225-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 83 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Monroe County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Monroe County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~225-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Monroe CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 83 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Monroe County's boundary and the 210,864 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~225-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Monroe County sitting wholly inside the Interior PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Monroe 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 Monroe County — the ~225 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 Monroe County's 210,864 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 83 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 Monroe Countyread your own land →