Scotch Meadows, North Carolina, 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.
Even in Scotch Meadows, 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 Scotch Meadows 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 Scotch Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Scotch Meadows — the short answer
Scotch Meadows, North Carolina: USDA zone 8a, about 256 days between hard freezes, across 218 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 11
- Scotland County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 22
- Scotland County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~256
- Scotland County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 218 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 Scotland County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8a is Scotch Meadows's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Scotch Meadows's 256-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Scotch Meadows
Each reading below is measured for Scotch Meadows itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsScotch Meadows runs about 256 days between hard freezes (read from Scotland County, the closest normal to Scotch Meadows) — 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
MeasuredScotch Meadows 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 Scotch Meadows is in
Scotch Meadows sits in the Southeastern Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Scotch Meadows's own centroid rather than borrowed from Scotland County.
What Grows in Scotch Meadows
Every plant below cleared Scotch Meadows's own zone 8a and its 256-day season. Each card opens that plant's North Carolina profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Scotch Meadows?
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 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 22 — 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.
Documented around Scotch Meadows
Survey cells within 31 miles of Scotch Meadows checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 91 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Scotch Meadows
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Scotch Meadows. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- POOLE`S AUTO BODYBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- MARIE COTTON MILLSuperfund · 1.8 mi
- ADVANCED RECYCLINGBrownfields · 1.8 mi
- MLB- 93Nitrate · 1.8 mi
- MCCOLL INVESTORS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- CAROLINA & SOUTHERN PROCESSING CORPORATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- H W MCDONALDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- HOWELLS STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- CUMMINGS SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- COX STOP & SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- GORAYA LLC DBA STOP N SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- NIC'S PIC KWIK 10Underground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Scotch Meadows'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 Scotch Meadows.
Total Sites
272
within ~10 miles of Scotch Meadows
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Scotch Meadows
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Scotch Meadows
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Scotch Meadows, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Scotch Meadows — Toxics Release Inventory (20 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (194 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Scotch Meadows
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 Scotch Meadows average
Your land is one point inside Scotch Meadows
Everything above resolves to Scotch Meadows as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 218 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Scotland County’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 Scotch Meadows Average
Scotch Meadows Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Scotch Meadows
- ●One soil character for all of Scotch Meadows
- ●Frost dates read at Scotch Meadows's scale: Mar 11 to Nov 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Scotch Meadows's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Scotch Meadows
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Scotch Meadows, North Carolina — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Scotch Meadows averages can't show:
We read public map data around Scotch Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Scotch Meadows average
How we know this about Scotch Meadows
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 Scotland County’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 Scotch Meadows
When does frost risk typically end in Scotch Meadows?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Scotch Meadows typically lands around Mar 11, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Scotch Meadows?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Scotch Meadows typically arrives around Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 8, so the watching starts about Oct 23 — about 256 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Scotch Meadows?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Scotch Meadows sees about 256 frost-free days — roughly Mar 11 through Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 1 to Nov 8, about 221 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Scotch Meadows?
The federal record around Scotch Meadows is a meaningful one — 272 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (194), the nearest Brownfields record about 1.4 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 Scotch Meadows?
From about Oct 23 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 22 (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 22. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Scotch Meadows's scale — its 8a band and its 256-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Scotch Meadows'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 Scotch Meadows’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Scotch Meadows's own scale — the 218 acres it covers and 272 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Scotch Meadows's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 272 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Scotch Meadows, the closest Brownfields record about 1.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Scotch Meadows's boundary and the 218 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~256-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Scotch Meadows's own centroid, the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Scotch Meadows checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Scotch Meadows has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Scotland County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Scotch Meadows's 218 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 Scotch Meadows's 218 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Scotch Meadows you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 218 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 1.4 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 Scotch Meadows-wide figureread your own land →
More in North Carolina
Growing region
Nearby growing guides