Tillman County, in Oklahoma, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
The conditions favor cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Tillman County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Tillman 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 Tillman County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Tillman County — the short answer
Tillman County, Oklahoma: USDA zone 8a, about 251 days between hard freezes, across 558K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~251
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 558K 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 Tillman County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Tillman County's 251-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Tillman County
Across a year, Tillman County accumulates about 5,477 growing degree days above 50°F, about 757 more than the middle Oklahoma county — ahead of every other Oklahoma county. 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 1,647 hours below 45°F, 272 fewer than the Oklahoma middle of 1,919. 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 Tillman County
Across Tillman County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Tipton, Foard, and Tillman are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.9, slightly alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
47%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Tillman County
The USDA soil survey maps 85% of Tillman County as well drained — but another 12% drains differently: 5% somewhat excessively drained, 4% excessively drained.
Tipton is the most extensive named soil at 13% of mapped acres, then Foard (10%) and Tillman (9%).
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 Tillman County
Each reading below is measured for Tillman 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 Tillman 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 Tillman County runs about pH 7.0–7.9, on the alkaline side.
Many vegetables cope, but acid-lovers like blueberries struggle, and iron and manganese lock up above about pH 7.5 — leaves yellow between the veins even in rich soil.
Elemental sulfur and generous organic matter lower pH slowly for the beds that need it; test first so you add only what the soil actually calls for.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredTillman County 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
MeasuredTillman 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 Tillman County is in
Tillman County sits in the Central Great Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Tillman County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Tillman County's own USDA zone 8a and its own 251-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 Oklahoma profile.
Is it too late to plant in Tillman 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 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 12 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 18 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Tillman County
- monarch butterfly18 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Tillman County
USGS estimates 148,976 lb of Glyphosate on Tillman County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (67,097 lb) and Acetochlor (61,252 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 Tillman County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Tillman County — 99 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Toxics Release Inventory facility. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Tillman County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Tillman County
Closest first, across Tillman County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FREDERICKPFAS · 1.9 mi
- Frederick Municipal AirportUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- HENNIGES AUTOMOTIVE OKLAHOMA INCToxics Release Inventory · 3.9 mi
- HENNIGES AUTOMOTIVE OKLAHOMA INCBrownfields · 3.9 mi
- J & J Party ShopUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
- Frederick High School - BusUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
- Hop & SackUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.8 mi
- Max KirkpatrickUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- Mangum Oil & GasUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- Harper's RestaurantUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- Jim's Truck StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- Farmers Oil 183 Fuel StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Tillman 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 Tillman County.
Total Sites
99
across Tillman County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
across Tillman County
Severity Distribution
across Tillman County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Tillman County, two things run higher than the national average across Tillman County — CAFO (3 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (70 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Tillman 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 Tillman County average
Your land is one point inside Tillman County
Everything above resolves to Tillman County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 558K 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 Tillman County Average
Tillman County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Tillman County
- ●One soil character for all of Tillman County
- ●Frost dates read at Tillman County's scale: Mar 12 to Nov 18
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Tillman County's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Tillman County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Tillman County, Oklahoma — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Tillman County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Tillman County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Tillman County average
How we know this about Tillman 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 Tillman County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Tillman County
When does frost risk typically end in Tillman County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Tillman County typically lands around Mar 12, 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 2.
How long is the growing season in Tillman County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Tillman County sees about 251 frost-free days — roughly Mar 12 through Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 2 to Nov 4, about 216 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Tillman County?
The federal record around Tillman County shows 99 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (70), the nearest PFAS record about 1.9 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Tillman County's scale — its 8a band and its 251-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Tillman 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 Oklahoma's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Tillman County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Tillman County's own scale — its own ~251-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 99 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Tillman County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Tillman County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~251-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Tillman CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 99 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest PFAS record about 1.9 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Tillman County's boundary and the 557,525 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~251-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Tillman County sitting wholly inside the Central Great PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Tillman County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Tillman County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Oklahoma grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Oklahoma
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Tillman County — the ~251 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 Tillman County's 557,525 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 99 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 Tillman Countyread your own land →