Lowndes County, in Mississippi, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
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.
Lowndes County lies within the Black Belt — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Lowndes County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lowndes County, 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 Lowndes County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lowndes County — the short answer
Lowndes County, Mississippi: USDA zone 8b, about 263 days between hard freezes, across 324K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~263
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 324K 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 8b is Lowndes County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lowndes County's 263-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Lowndes County
Across a year, Lowndes County accumulates about 5,392 growing degree days above 50°F, about 6 fewer than the middle Mississippi county — ahead of 40 of Mississippi’s 82 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 1,306 hours below 45°F, 114 more than the Mississippi middle of 1,192. 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 Lowndes County
Across Lowndes County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Vaiden, Savannah, and Leeper are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silty clay surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.0–7.0, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
51%
Hydric soils
9%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lowndes County
The USDA soil survey maps 33% of Lowndes County as well drained — but another 62% drains differently: 29% somewhat poorly drained, 25% moderately well drained.
Vaiden is the most extensive named soil at 11% of mapped acres, then Savannah (9%) and Leeper (8%).
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 Lowndes County
Each reading below is measured for Lowndes County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Lowndes County are well drained, in hydrologic group D — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Lowndes County runs about pH 5.0–7.0, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredLowndes County runs about 263 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
MeasuredLowndes County 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 Lowndes County is in
Lowndes County sits in the Southeastern Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Lowndes County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lowndes County's own USDA zone 8b and its own 263-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 Mississippi profile.
Is it too late to plant in Lowndes County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 21 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. In a climate this gentle, “too late” hardly applies — the question becomes which crops prefer the cooler months ahead.
What gets applied to farmland in Lowndes County
USGS estimates 139,250 lb of Glyphosate on Lowndes County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (40,556 lb) and 2,4-d (20,518 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 Lowndes County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lowndes County — 414 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 6 Superfund sites. 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 Lowndes 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 Lowndes County
Closest first, across Lowndes County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ABB MOTORS AND MECHANICAL INCBrownfields · 2500 ft
- ABB MOTORS AND MECHANICAL INCToxics Release Inventory · 2500 ft
- Billy's Minit MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Columbus Coca Cola BottlingUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Fran's Quick StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Old Loco Joe BuildingUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Barksdale Gulf StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Apac MississippiUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- Fletcher Oil CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- Newman Oil CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- Sanders Oil CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- COLUMBUS DIESEL SERVICE INCBrownfields · 1.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lowndes County'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 Lowndes County.
Sources Checked
across Lowndes County
Severity Distribution
across Lowndes County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lowndes County, two things run higher than the national average across Lowndes County — PFAS (5 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (33 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Lowndes County
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 Lowndes County average
Your land is one point inside Lowndes County
Everything above resolves to Lowndes County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 324K 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 Lowndes County Average
Lowndes County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Lowndes County
- ●One soil character for all of Lowndes County
- ●Frost dates read at Lowndes County's scale: Mar 3 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lowndes County's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lowndes County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lowndes County, Mississippi — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lowndes County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lowndes County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lowndes County average
How we know this about Lowndes County
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 Lowndes County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lowndes County
When does frost risk typically end in Lowndes County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lowndes County typically lands around Mar 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 Mar 24.
How long is the growing season in Lowndes County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lowndes County sees about 263 frost-free days — roughly Mar 3 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 24 to Nov 7, about 228 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lowndes County?
The federal record around Lowndes County is a meaningful one — 414 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (231), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.5 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 Lowndes County's scale — its 8b band and its 263-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lowndes County'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 Mississippi's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Lowndes County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Lowndes County's own scale — its own ~263-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 414 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lowndes County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lowndes County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~263-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Lowndes CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 414 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 0.5 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Lowndes County's boundary and the 323,883 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~263-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Lowndes County sitting wholly inside the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lowndes County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Mississippi grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Mississippi
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Lowndes County — the ~263 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 Lowndes County's 323,883 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 414 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 Lowndes Countyread your own land →