Vernon Parish, in Louisiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Growers here do well with artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Vernon Parish lies within the Piney Woods — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Vernon Parish holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Vernon Parish, 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 Vernon Parish — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Vernon Parish — the short answer
Vernon Parish, Louisiana: USDA zone 9a, about 295 days between hard freezes, across 849K acres.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~295
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 849K 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 9a is Vernon Parish's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Vernon Parish's 295-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Vernon Parish
Across a year, Vernon Parish accumulates about 6,204 growing degree days above 50°F, about 92 fewer than the middle Louisiana county — ahead of 30 of Louisiana’s 64 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.
Winter banks about 670 hours below 45°F, 58 more than the Louisiana middle of 612. Chill is what tells a fruit tree its dormancy is over, and it is set by climate rather than by anything you can build.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Vernon County
Across Vernon County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Malbis, Guyton, and Eastwood are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a fine sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.2–5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
39%
Hydric soils
21%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Vernon Parish
The USDA soil survey maps 39% of Vernon Parish as moderately well drained — but another 60% drains differently: 22% well drained, 21% poorly drained.
Malbis is the most extensive named soil at 18% of mapped acres, then Guyton (14%) and Eastwood (11%).
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 Vernon Parish
Each reading below is measured for Vernon Parish itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Vernon Parish are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group C — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Vernon Parish runs about pH 5.2–5.5, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Wet ground
MeasuredAbout 21% of Vernon Parish is mapped as hydric — wetland — soil.
If your lot falls in one of those pockets, a standard in-ground bed will fight waterlogging all season, and roots that need air will struggle.
Check how your own ground drains before you dig; raised beds or moisture-loving plantings turn a wet corner from a problem into a niche.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredVernon Parish runs about 295 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
The kind of country Vernon Parish is in
Vernon Parish sits in the South Central Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Vernon Parish
We scored all 1,086 plants against Vernon Parish's own USDA zone 9a and its own 295-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 Louisiana profile.
Is it too late to plant in Vernon Parish?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 3 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
Documented around Vernon Parish
- monarch butterfly6 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Vernon Parish
USGS estimates 3,906 lb of Dicamba on Vernon Parish farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (2,900 lb) and Glyphosate (2,510 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 Vernon County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Vernon County — 556 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites (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 Vernon 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 Vernon Parish
Closest first, across Vernon County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- D & J AUTO RPR & BODY SHOPBrownfields · 2100 ft
- V-515Nitrate · 0.8 mi
- CLASSIC COLLISION CENTERBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- North End MobilUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- V-504Nitrate · 1.1 mi
- RELIABLE TRASH SERVICE COBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- USARMY JRTC & FORT POLKToxics Release Inventory · 1.6 mi
- FT POLK COCO FUELINGBrownfields · 2.0 mi
- LA NATL GUARD MATES 71Brownfields · 2.2 mi
- LA ANG TUSA SUPPORTBrownfields · 2.3 mi
- LOGREE AUTOMOTIVE & COLLISION CTRBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- FORT POLK NORTH WATER SYSTEMPFAS · 2.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Vernon Parish'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 Vernon Parish.
Total Sites
556
across Vernon County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Vernon County
Severity Distribution
across Vernon County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Vernon Parish, two things run higher than the national average across Vernon County — PFAS (7 sites) and Nitrate (212 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Vernon Parish
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 Vernon Parish average
Your land is one point inside Vernon Parish
Everything above resolves to Vernon Parish as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 849K 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 Vernon Parish Average
Vernon Parish Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Vernon Parish
- ●One soil character for all of Vernon Parish
- ●Frost dates read at Vernon Parish's scale: Feb 11 to Dec 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Vernon Parish's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Vernon Parish
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Vernon Parish, Louisiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Vernon Parish averages can't show:
We read public map data around Vernon Parish — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Vernon Parish average
How we know this about Vernon Parish
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 Vernon Parish carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Vernon Parish
When does frost risk typically end in Vernon Parish?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Vernon Parish typically lands around Feb 11, 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 Mar 4.
How long is the growing season in Vernon Parish?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Vernon Parish sees about 295 frost-free days — roughly Feb 11 through Dec 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 4 to Nov 19, about 260 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Vernon Parish?
The federal record around Vernon Parish is a meaningful one — 556 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (212), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.4 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 Vernon Parish's scale — its 9a band and its 295-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Vernon Parish'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 Louisiana's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Vernon Parish’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Vernon Parish's own scale — its own ~295-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 556 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Vernon Parish's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Vernon Parish's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~295-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Vernon ParishUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 556 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 0.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Vernon Parish's boundary and the 849,105 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~295-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Vernon Parish sitting wholly inside the South Central PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Vernon Parish for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Vernon Parish farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Louisiana grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Louisiana
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Vernon Parish — the ~295 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 Vernon Parish's 849,105 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 556 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 Vernon Parishread your own land →