Deercroft, North Carolina, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
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.
Even in Deercroft, 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 Deercroft 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 Deercroft — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Deercroft — the short answer
Deercroft, North Carolina: USDA zone 8a, about 251 days between hard freezes, across 826 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~251
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 826 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 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 Deercroft's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Deercroft's 251-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Deercroft
Each reading below is measured for Deercroft itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredDeercroft runs about 251 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
MeasuredDeercroft 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 Deercroft is in
Deercroft sits in the Southeastern Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Deercroft's own centroid rather than borrowed from Scotland County.
What Grows in Deercroft
Every plant below cleared Deercroft's own zone 8a and its 251-day season. Each card opens that plant's North Carolina profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Deercroft?
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 Feb 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Deercroft
Survey cells within 31 miles of Deercroft checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 75 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Deercroft
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Deercroft. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- THE POINT AT DEERCROFTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- J P STEVENS & CO INC SCOTLAND PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 1.9 mi
- ROBBINS EXXONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- HIGHWAY CONSTRUCTORS, INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- YOU CAN'T FIND ITUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- SC-083 JORDAN CRK S HILLNitrate · 5.5 mi
- RAEFORD CONTAMINATED WELLSSuperfund · 5.5 mi
- GAINEY GRAIN, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 5.5 mi
- TECHNISEAL US - ABERDEEN PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 5.7 mi
- MONROE'S GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- MASSEY'S GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- MIDWAY GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Deercroft'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 Deercroft.
Total Sites
93
within ~10 miles of Deercroft
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Deercroft
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Deercroft
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Deercroft, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Deercroft — Superfund (4 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (9 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Deercroft
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 Deercroft average
Your land is one point inside Deercroft
Everything above resolves to Deercroft as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 826 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 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 Deercroft Average
Deercroft Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Deercroft
- ●One soil character for all of Deercroft
- ●Frost dates read at Deercroft's scale: Mar 13 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Deercroft's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Deercroft
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Deercroft, North Carolina — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Deercroft averages can't show:
We read public map data around Deercroft — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Deercroft average
How we know this about Deercroft
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 Deercroft’s own record; 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 Deercroft
When does frost risk typically end in Deercroft?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Deercroft typically lands around Mar 13, 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 Apr 3.
When is the first frost in Deercroft?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Deercroft typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 251 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Deercroft?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Deercroft sees about 251 frost-free days — roughly Mar 13 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 3 to Nov 5, about 216 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Deercroft?
The federal record around Deercroft is a meaningful one — 93 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (54), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Deercroft?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Deercroft's scale — its 8a band and its 251-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Deercroft'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 Deercroft’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Deercroft's own scale — its own ~251-day season between 28°F freezes, the 826 acres it covers and 93 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Deercroft's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Deercroft's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 13 and Nov 19 and the ~251-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 93 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Deercroft, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Deercroft's boundary and the 826 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~251-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Deercroft's own centroid, the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Deercroft checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Deercroft's 826 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Scotland County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Scotland County
- The growing challenges every North Carolina grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom North Carolina
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Scotland County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Deercroft's 826 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Deercroft you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 826 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Deercroft-wide figureread your own land →
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