Pontotoc County, in Mississippi, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Pontotoc County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Pontotoc County — the short answer
Pontotoc County, Mississippi: USDA zone 8a, about 258 days between hard freezes, across 319K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~258
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 319K 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 8a is Pontotoc County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pontotoc County's 258-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Pontotoc County
Across a year, Pontotoc County accumulates about 4,928 growing degree days above 50°F, about 470 fewer than the middle Mississippi county — ahead of 12 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 1,577 hours below 45°F, 385 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 Pontotoc County
Across Pontotoc County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Providence, Falkner, and Arkabutla are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.0–5.3, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
27%
Hydric soils
9%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Pontotoc County
The USDA soil survey maps 47% of Pontotoc County as moderately well drained — but another 52% drains differently: 33% somewhat poorly drained, 10% well drained.
Providence is the most extensive named soil at 16% of mapped acres, then Falkner (7%) and Arkabutla (7%).
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 Pontotoc County
Each reading below is measured for Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County 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 Pontotoc County runs about pH 5.0–5.3, 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
Season length
MeasuredPontotoc County runs about 258 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredPontotoc County sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a.
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 Pontotoc County is in
Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Pontotoc County's own USDA zone 8a and its own 258-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 Pontotoc County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 8 (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. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
What gets applied to farmland in Pontotoc County
USGS estimates 40,594 lb of Glyphosate on Pontotoc County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (8,783 lb) and Dimethenamid-p (7,872 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 Pontotoc County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Pontotoc County — 168 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 15 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County
Closest first, across Pontotoc County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CITY OF PONTOTOCPFAS · 0.9 mi
- OAK HILL WATER ASSNPFAS · 0.9 mi
- Waldo's Hilltop Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- Waldo GulfUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- Pontotoc Mini MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- NewmartUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- MAPP AUTO PARTS INCBrownfields · 1.7 mi
- Tullas DeliUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- Pontotoc Country VillageUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- Ray's ExxonUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- INDEPENDENT FURNITURE SUPPLY COToxics Release Inventory · 1.8 mi
- Old Ford PlaceUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County.
Total Sites
168
across Pontotoc County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
15 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Pontotoc County
Severity Distribution
across Pontotoc County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pontotoc County, two things run higher than the national average across Pontotoc County — PFAS (4 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (15 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 Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County average
Your land is one point inside Pontotoc County
Everything above resolves to Pontotoc County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 319K 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 Pontotoc County Average
Pontotoc County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Pontotoc County
- ●One soil character for all of Pontotoc County
- ●Frost dates read at Pontotoc County's scale: Mar 8 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pontotoc County's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Pontotoc County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pontotoc County, Mississippi — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pontotoc County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pontotoc County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pontotoc County average
How we know this about Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Pontotoc County
When does frost risk typically end in Pontotoc County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pontotoc County typically lands around Mar 8, 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 29.
How long is the growing season in Pontotoc County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pontotoc County sees about 258 frost-free days — roughly Mar 8 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 29 to Nov 7, about 223 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pontotoc County?
The federal record around Pontotoc County is a meaningful one — 168 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (97), the nearest PFAS record about 0.9 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 Pontotoc County's scale — its 8a band and its 258-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Pontotoc County's own scale — its own ~258-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 168 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pontotoc County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pontotoc County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~258-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Pontotoc CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 168 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest PFAS record about 0.9 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Pontotoc County's boundary and the 318,600 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~258-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Pontotoc County sitting wholly inside the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Pontotoc 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 Pontotoc County — the ~258 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 Pontotoc County's 318,600 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 168 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 Pontotoc Countyread your own land →