Opelousas, Louisiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
On paper, artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Opelousas, 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 Opelousas 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 Opelousas — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Opelousas — the short answer
Opelousas, Louisiana: USDA zone 9a, about 306 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 3
- St. Landry Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 6
- St. Landry Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~306
- St. Landry Parish normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 6K 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 St. Landry Parish’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Opelousas's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Opelousas's 306-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Opelousas
Each reading below is measured for Opelousas itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsOpelousas runs about 306 days between hard freezes (read from St. Landry Parish, the closest normal to Opelousas) — 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
MeasuredOpelousas sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a.
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 Opelousas is in
Opelousas sits in the Western Gulf Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Opelousas's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: St. Landry Parish is mostly Mississippi Alluvial Plain. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Opelousas
Every plant below cleared Opelousas's own zone 9a and its 306-day season. Each card opens that plant's Louisiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Opelousas?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 6 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Opelousas
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Opelousas. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Benoit's Phillips 66Underground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- THE BODY SHOP LTDBrownfields · 200 ft
- B&B Minute MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- O'REILLY AUTO PARTS 639Brownfields · 200 ft
- Roy's TexacoUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Al's Tire & More IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- COWART POLY CLEANBrownfields · 1100 ft
- Union Street BayouUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- WALGREEN DRUG STORE 7426Brownfields · 1700 ft
- SAVE-A-LOT #4756Brownfields · 2000 ft
- Coastal Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- LA Technical College - T H Harris CampusUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Opelousas'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 Opelousas.
Total Sites
591
within ~10 miles of Opelousas
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Opelousas
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Opelousas
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Opelousas, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Opelousas — Nitrate (172 sites) and PFAS (5 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Opelousas
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 Opelousas average
Your land is one point inside Opelousas
Everything above resolves to Opelousas as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 6K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from St. Landry Parish’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’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 city 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 Opelousas Average
Opelousas Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Opelousas
- ●One soil character for all of Opelousas
- ●Frost dates read at Opelousas's scale: Feb 3 to Dec 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Opelousas's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Opelousas
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Opelousas, Louisiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Opelousas averages can't show:
We read public map data around Opelousas — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Opelousas average
How we know this about Opelousas
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at St. Landry 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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Opelousas
When does frost risk typically end in Opelousas?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Opelousas typically lands around Feb 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Opelousas?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Opelousas typically arrives around Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 22, so the watching starts about Nov 6 — about 306 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Opelousas?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Opelousas sees about 306 frost-free days — roughly Feb 3 through Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 24 to Nov 22, about 271 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Opelousas?
The federal record around Opelousas is a meaningful one — 591 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (265), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Opelousas?
From about Nov 6 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Opelousas's scale — its 9a band and its 306-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Opelousas'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 Opelousas’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Opelousas's own scale — the 6,190 acres it covers and 591 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Opelousas's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 591 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Opelousas, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Opelousas's boundary and the 6,190 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~306-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Opelousas sits in the Western Gulf Coastal Plain — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Opelousas has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom St. Landry Parish
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Opelousas's 6,190 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom St. Landry County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom St. Landry 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 St. Landry County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Opelousas's 6,190 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Opelousas you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,190 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 Opelousas-wide figureread your own land →