Tolu, Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Tolu, 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 Tolu 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 Tolu — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Tolu — the short answer
Tolu, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 231 days between hard freezes, across 222 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~231
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 222 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 Tolu's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Tolu's 231-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Tolu
Each reading below is measured for Tolu itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredTolu runs about 231 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
MeasuredTolu 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 Tolu is in
Tolu sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Tolu's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Crittenden County is mostly Interior Plateau. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Tolu
Every plant below cleared Tolu's own zone 7a and its 231-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Tolu?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 25; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — 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 Tolu
Survey cells within 31 miles of Tolu checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 124 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Tolu
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Tolu. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Workmans Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- Tolu GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- Brazell GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- Tolu Elementary SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- H07A0006Nitrate · 800 ft
- H07A0005Nitrate · 1600 ft
- Alco-Palmer Lead MineMining · 3.2 mi
- Patrick MineMining · 3.2 mi
- FRICKER MACHINE SHOPBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- IDOT ELIZABETHTOWN TEAM SECTION 922EBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- David Reed SunocoUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- Robinson Oil CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Tolu'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 Tolu.
Total Sites
135
within ~10 miles of Tolu
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Tolu
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Tolu
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Tolu, Mining runs higher than the national average — 69 sites within ~10 miles of Tolu. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Tolu
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 Tolu average
Your land is one point inside Tolu
Everything above resolves to Tolu as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 222 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 town 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 Tolu Average
Tolu Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Tolu
- ●One soil character for all of Tolu
- ●Frost dates read at Tolu's scale: Mar 25 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Tolu's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Tolu
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Tolu, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Tolu averages can't show:
We read public map data around Tolu — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Tolu average
How we know this about Tolu
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Tolu’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 town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-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 Tolu
When does frost risk typically end in Tolu?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Tolu typically lands around Mar 25, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Tolu?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Tolu typically arrives around Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 28, so the watching starts about Oct 12 — about 231 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Tolu?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Tolu sees about 231 frost-free days — roughly Mar 25 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 15 to Oct 28, about 196 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Tolu?
The federal record around Tolu runs heavier than most — 135 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (69), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Tolu?
From about Oct 12 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 11 (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 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Tolu's scale — its 7a band and its 231-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Tolu'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 Tolu’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Tolu's own scale — its own ~231-day season between 28°F freezes, the 222 acres it covers and 135 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Tolu's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Tolu's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 25 and Nov 11 and the ~231-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 135 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Tolu, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Tolu's boundary and the 222 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~231-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Tolu sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Tolu 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 Tolu's 222 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Crittenden County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Crittenden 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 Crittenden County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Tolu's 222 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Tolu you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 222 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 Tolu-wide figureread your own land →
More in Kentucky
Growing region