Buras, Louisiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
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 Buras, 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 Buras 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 Buras — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Buras — the short answer
Buras, Louisiana: USDA zone 10a, about 338 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 10a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~338
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 10a is Buras's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Buras's 338-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Buras
Each reading below is measured for Buras itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBuras runs about 338 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredBuras sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a.
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 Buras is in
Buras sits in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Buras's own centroid rather than borrowed from Plaquemines Parish.
What Grows in Buras
Every plant below cleared Buras's own zone 10a and its 338-day season. Each card opens that plant's Louisiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Buras?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. 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 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 20 — 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 Buras
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Buras. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Happy Land Food MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- BORNE OWEN SR & JR BOAT SERVICEBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- BELLSOUTH TELECOMMUNIATIONS INC J2530Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- BellSouth Telecommunications Inc J2530Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- KENS BOAT RENTAL INCBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- BURASBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- PLAQUEMINES PARISH SCHOOL BOARD SOUTHBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- Solid Waste South Maintenance ShedUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Red Man Pipe & SupplyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Blanchard's Auto & Industrial SuppliesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- CVITANOVIC BOAT SVC INCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- DANOS & CUROLE MARINE CONTRACTORSBrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Buras'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 Buras.
Total Sites
50
within ~10 miles of Buras
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Buras
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Buras
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Buras, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 34 sites within ~10 miles of Buras. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Buras
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 Buras average
Your land is one point inside Buras
Everything above resolves to Buras as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Buras Average
Buras Average
- ●USDA Zones 10a, averaged across Buras
- ●One soil character for all of Buras
- ●Frost dates read at Buras's scale: Jan 16 to Dec 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Buras's 10a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Buras
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Buras, Louisiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Buras averages can't show:
We read public map data around Buras — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Buras average
How we know this about Buras
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 Buras’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 Buras
When does frost risk typically end in Buras?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Buras typically lands around Jan 16, 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 6.
When is the first frost in Buras?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Buras typically arrives around Dec 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Dec 6, so the watching starts about Nov 20 — about 338 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Buras?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Buras sees about 338 frost-free days — roughly Jan 16 through Dec 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 6 to Dec 6, about 303 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Buras?
The federal record around Buras shows 50 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (34), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Buras?
From about Nov 20 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Buras's scale — its 10a band and its 338-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Buras'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 Buras’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Buras's own scale — its own ~338-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,471 acres it covers and 50 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Buras's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Buras's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Jan 16 and Dec 20 and the ~338-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 50 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Buras, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Buras's boundary and the 1,471 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 10a and a ~338-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Buras's own centroid, the Mississippi Alluvial PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Buras's 1,471 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Plaquemines County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Plaquemines 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 Plaquemines County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Buras's 1,471 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Buras you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,471 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Buras-wide figureread your own land →