Nebo, Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Nebo, 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 Nebo 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 Nebo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Nebo — the short answer
Nebo, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 159 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 159 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 7a is Nebo's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Nebo's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Nebo
Each reading below is measured for Nebo itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNebo runs about 232 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
MeasuredNebo 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 Nebo is in
Nebo sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Nebo's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hopkins County.
What Grows in Nebo
Every plant below cleared Nebo's own zone 7a and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Nebo?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 23 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 10 — 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 Nebo
Survey cells within 31 miles of Nebo checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 99 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Nebo
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Nebo. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Lantrips Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- Nebo Service CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- H9A0050Nitrate · 450 ft
- H9A0052Nitrate · 1600 ft
- H9A0051Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- H9C0062Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- ANR Pipeline Co - Madisonville Transmission StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- ANR PIPELINE MADISONVILLE CSBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- Ray WeirUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- H9B0018Nitrate · 1.9 mi
- KY Forge Gte Products CorpUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- H9B0019Nitrate · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Nebo'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 Nebo.
Total Sites
284
within ~10 miles of Nebo
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Nebo
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Nebo
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Nebo, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Nebo — PFAS (3 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (200 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.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Nebo
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 Nebo average
Your land is one point inside Nebo
Everything above resolves to Nebo as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 159 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 Nebo Average
Nebo Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Nebo
- ●One soil character for all of Nebo
- ●Frost dates read at Nebo's scale: Mar 23 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Nebo's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Nebo
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Nebo, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Nebo averages can't show:
We read public map data around Nebo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Nebo average
How we know this about Nebo
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 Nebo’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 Nebo
When does frost risk typically end in Nebo?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Nebo typically lands around Mar 23, 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 13.
When is the first frost in Nebo?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Nebo typically arrives around Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 27, so the watching starts about Oct 11 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Nebo?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Nebo sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 23 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 13 to Oct 27, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Nebo?
The federal record around Nebo is a meaningful one — 284 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (200), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Nebo?
From about Oct 11 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 10 (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 10. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Nebo's scale — its 7a band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Nebo'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 Nebo’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Nebo's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 159 acres it covers and 284 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Nebo's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Nebo's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 23 and Nov 10 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 284 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Nebo, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Nebo's boundary and the 159 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Nebo's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Nebo 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 Nebo's 159 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hopkins County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hopkins County
- The growing challenges every Kentucky grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kentucky
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Hopkins County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Nebo's 159 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Nebo you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 159 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Nebo-wide figureread your own land →