Nelson County, in Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Nelson County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Nelson 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 Nelson County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Nelson County — the short answer
Nelson County, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 226 days between hard freezes, across 268K 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 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~226
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 268K 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 Nelson County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Nelson County's 226-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Nelson County
Across a year, Nelson County accumulates about 3,891 growing degree days above 50°F, about 231 more than the middle Kentucky county — ahead of 83 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 Nelson County
Across Nelson County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Lowell, Pembroke, and Rockcastle are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.5–6.5, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
28%
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Nelson County
The USDA soil survey maps 73% of Nelson County as well drained — but another 23% drains differently: 9% moderately well drained, 8% somewhat excessively drained.
Lowell is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Pembroke (9%) and Rockcastle (6%).
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 Nelson County
Each reading below is measured for Nelson 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 Nelson 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 Nelson County runs about pH 5.5–6.5, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredNelson County runs about 226 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
MeasuredNelson 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 Nelson County is in
Nelson 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 Nelson County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Nelson County's own USDA zone 7a and its own 226-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 Nelson 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 9 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Nelson County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Nelson County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 71 miles off. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle2 documented records
- monarch butterfly5 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Nelson County
USGS estimates 73,038 lb of Glyphosate on Nelson County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (28,311 lb) and Atrazine (18,385 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 Nelson County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Nelson County — 187 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed). 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 Nelson 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 Nelson County
Closest first, across Nelson County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BARDSTOWN MUNICIPAL WATER DEPTPFAS · 1200 ft
- AT&T Mobility LS 1480 Bardstown DT DOBUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- Appu StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Yonts GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Stephen Foster Chevron No 1851Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Ices ProduceUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- KENNY'S CLEANERSBrownfields · 2400 ft
- Bradys ChevronUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- My Old Kentucky Home State ParkUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Hamilton EngineeringUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Bulk Plant Old Spank OilUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Binkley DistributingUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Nelson 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 Nelson County.
Total Sites
187
across Nelson County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Nelson County
Severity Distribution
across Nelson County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Nelson County, two things run higher than the national average across Nelson County — Toxics Release Inventory (15 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (136 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Nelson 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 Nelson County average
Your land is one point inside Nelson County
Everything above resolves to Nelson County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 268K 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 Nelson County Average
Nelson County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Nelson County
- ●One soil character for all of Nelson County
- ●Frost dates read at Nelson County's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Nelson County's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Nelson County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Nelson County, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Nelson County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Nelson County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Nelson County average
How we know this about Nelson 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 Nelson County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Nelson County
When does frost risk typically end in Nelson County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Nelson 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 Nelson County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Nelson County sees about 226 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Oct 26, about 191 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Nelson County?
The federal record around Nelson County is a meaningful one — 187 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (136), the nearest PFAS record about 0.2 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 Nelson County's scale — its 7a band and its 226-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Nelson 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 Nelson County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Nelson County's own scale — its own ~226-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 187 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Nelson County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Nelson County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~226-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Nelson CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 187 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest PFAS record about 0.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Nelson County's boundary and the 267,959 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~226-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Nelson County sitting wholly inside the Interior PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Nelson County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Nelson 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 Nelson County — the ~226 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 Nelson County's 267,959 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 187 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 Nelson Countyread your own land →