Heflin, Louisiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Heflin, 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 Heflin 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 Heflin — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Heflin — the short answer
Heflin, Louisiana: USDA zone 8b, about 275 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 25
- Webster Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 27
- Webster Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~275
- Webster Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 Webster Parish’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Heflin's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Heflin's 275-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Heflin
Each reading below is measured for Heflin itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsHeflin runs about 275 days between hard freezes (read from Webster Parish, the closest normal to Heflin) — 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
MeasuredHeflin sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Heflin is in
Heflin sits in the South Central Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Heflin's own centroid rather than borrowed from Webster Parish.
What Grows in Heflin
Every plant below cleared Heflin's own zone 8b and its 275-day season. Each card opens that plant's Louisiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Heflin?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 27 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With almost year-round growing weather, timing is about heat and rainfall more than frost — some bench is always in play.
What's on the federal record near Heflin
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Heflin. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Wb-249Nitrate · 1700 ft
- Wb-250Nitrate · 1700 ft
- Wb-39Nitrate · 1900 ft
- DIXIE METALS CORPBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Wb-376Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- Austin's Country StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- C-V DavisUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL STORE #22870Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- Franklin's GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Wb-65Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- Wb-40Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- Heflin BarnUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Heflin'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 Heflin.
Total Sites
272
within ~10 miles of Heflin
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
6 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Heflin
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Heflin
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Heflin, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 138 sites within ~10 miles of Heflin. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Heflin
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 Heflin average
Your land is one point inside Heflin
Everything above resolves to Heflin as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 1K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Webster 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 Heflin Average
Heflin Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Heflin
- ●One soil character for all of Heflin
- ●Frost dates read at Heflin's scale: Feb 25 to Nov 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Heflin's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Heflin
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Heflin, Louisiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Heflin averages can't show:
We read public map data around Heflin — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Heflin average
How we know this about Heflin
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 Webster 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 Heflin
When does frost risk typically end in Heflin?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Heflin typically lands around Feb 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 Mar 18.
When is the first frost in Heflin?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Heflin typically arrives around Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 13, so the watching starts about Oct 28 — about 275 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Heflin?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Heflin sees about 275 frost-free days — roughly Feb 25 through Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 18 to Nov 13, about 240 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Heflin?
The federal record around Heflin is a meaningful one — 272 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (138), the nearest Nitrate 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 Heflin?
From about Oct 28 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 27 (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 27. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Heflin's scale — its 8b band and its 275-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Heflin'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 Heflin’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Heflin's own scale — the 1,224 acres it covers and 272 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Heflin's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 272 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Heflin, the closest Nitrate record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Heflin's boundary and the 1,224 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~275-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Heflin's own centroid, the South Central PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Heflin has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Webster Parish
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Heflin's 1,224 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Webster County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Webster 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 Webster County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Heflin's 1,224 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Heflin you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,224 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Heflin-wide figureread your own land →
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