Bayou L'Ourse, Louisiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Bayou L'Ourse, 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 Bayou L'Ourse 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 Bayou L'Ourse — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Bayou L'Ourse — the short answer
Bayou L'Ourse, Louisiana: USDA zone 9b, about 318 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 27
- Assumption Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 11
- Assumption Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~318
- Assumption Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 2K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Assumption Parish’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9b is Bayou L'Ourse's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bayou L'Ourse's 318-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bayou L'Ourse
Each reading below is measured for Bayou L'Ourse itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsBayou L'Ourse runs about 318 days between hard freezes (read from Assumption Parish, the closest normal to Bayou L'Ourse) — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBayou L'Ourse sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b.
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 Bayou L'Ourse is in
Bayou L'Ourse sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bayou L'Ourse's own centroid rather than borrowed from Assumption Parish.
What Grows in Bayou L'Ourse
Every plant below cleared Bayou L'Ourse's own zone 9b and its 318-day season. Each card opens that plant's Louisiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bayou L'Ourse?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 27 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 11 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the calendar nearly circles: cool-season crops take the winter shift, and the next window is always close.
What's on the federal record near Bayou L'Ourse
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bayou L'Ourse. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Bayou L'Ourse SupermarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- DANOS, LLC - AMELIA INTEGRATED SERVICES COMPLEX AISCBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- HEATHER LYNN INCBrownfields · 1.6 mi
- TEXAS GAS TRANSMISSION LLC - MORGAN CITY COMPRESSOR STATIONBrownfields · 1.8 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL #15601Brownfields · 1.8 mi
- MURPHY EXP & PROD CO WAREHOUSEBrownfields · 1.8 mi
- NOV TURBOSCOPE - AMELIA NORTH COATING PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 2.8 mi
- NOV TURBOSCOPE - AMELIA NORTH COATING PLANTBrownfields · 2.8 mi
- BOSS-BOBCAT OILFIELD SOLUTIONS & SERVICESBrownfields · 2.8 mi
- National Oilwell Varco LP - Amelia North Coating PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
- PHI MORGAN CITY HELIPORTBrownfields · 3.0 mi
- Bailey's GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bayou L'Ourse'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 Bayou L'Ourse.
Total Sites
394
within ~10 miles of Bayou L'Ourse
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
21 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bayou L'Ourse
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bayou L'Ourse
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bayou L'Ourse, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 262 sites within ~10 miles of Bayou L'Ourse. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Bayou L'Ourse
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 Bayou L'Ourse average
Your land is one point inside Bayou L'Ourse
Everything above resolves to Bayou L'Ourse as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 2K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Assumption Parish’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 Bayou L'Ourse Average
Bayou L'Ourse Average
- ●USDA Zones 9b, averaged across Bayou L'Ourse
- ●One soil character for all of Bayou L'Ourse
- ●Frost dates read at Bayou L'Ourse's scale: Jan 27 to Dec 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bayou L'Ourse's 9b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bayou L'Ourse
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bayou L'Ourse, Louisiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bayou L'Ourse averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bayou L'Ourse — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bayou L'Ourse average
How we know this about Bayou L'Ourse
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 Assumption Parish’s record, because none resolves here; 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 Bayou L'Ourse
When does frost risk typically end in Bayou L'Ourse?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bayou L'Ourse typically lands around Jan 27, 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 Feb 17.
When is the first frost in Bayou L'Ourse?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bayou L'Ourse typically arrives around Dec 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 27, so the watching starts about Nov 11 — about 318 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bayou L'Ourse?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bayou L'Ourse sees about 318 frost-free days — roughly Jan 27 through Dec 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 17 to Nov 27, about 283 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bayou L'Ourse?
The federal record around Bayou L'Ourse is a meaningful one — 394 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (262), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Bayou L'Ourse?
From about Nov 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 Dec 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 Dec 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bayou L'Ourse's scale — its 9b band and its 318-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bayou L'Ourse'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 Bayou L'Ourse’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Bayou L'Ourse's own scale — the 1,743 acres it covers and 394 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bayou L'Ourse's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 394 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bayou L'Ourse, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bayou L'Ourse's boundary and the 1,743 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9b and a ~318-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bayou L'Ourse's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Bayou L'Ourse has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Assumption Parish
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bayou L'Ourse's 1,743 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Assumption County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Assumption County
- The growing challenges every Louisiana grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Louisiana
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Assumption County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bayou L'Ourse's 1,743 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bayou L'Ourse you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,743 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles 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 Bayou L'Ourse-wide figureread your own land →
More in Louisiana
Growing region
Nearby growing guides