Gallaway, Tennessee, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Expect cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Gallaway, 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 Gallaway 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 Gallaway — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Gallaway — the short answer
Gallaway, Tennessee: USDA zone 8a, about 261 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~261
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 4K 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 Gallaway's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Gallaway's 261-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Gallaway
Each reading below is measured for Gallaway itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGallaway runs about 261 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
MeasuredGallaway 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 Gallaway is in
Gallaway sits in the Mississippi Valley Loess Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Gallaway's own centroid rather than borrowed from Fayette County.
What Grows in Gallaway
Every plant below cleared Gallaway's own zone 8a and its 261-day season. Each card opens that plant's Tennessee profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Gallaway?
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 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 23 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With almost year-round growing weather, timing is about heat and rainfall more than frost — some bench is always in play.
Documented around Gallaway
Survey cells within 31 miles of Gallaway checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 166 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Gallaway
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Gallaway. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Chicksaw Motor LineUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Hale's GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- City Of GallawayUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Specialty Alloys CorpUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- CRYSTAL STEEL FABRICATORS, LLC - MEMPHIS DIVISIONBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Gallaway Health Care CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- TENN DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION DISTRICT 45Brownfields · 0.9 mi
- Gallaway MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Campbell Union 76Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Sonny Boys Drive InUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CRYSTAL STEEL MEMPHIS, LLCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- GALLAWAY PITSSuperfund · 2.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Gallaway'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 Gallaway.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Gallaway
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Gallaway
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Gallaway, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Gallaway — Toxics Release Inventory (14 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (99 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Gallaway
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 Gallaway average
Your land is one point inside Gallaway
Everything above resolves to Gallaway as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 city 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 Gallaway Average
Gallaway Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Gallaway
- ●One soil character for all of Gallaway
- ●Frost dates read at Gallaway's scale: Mar 7 to Nov 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Gallaway's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Gallaway
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Gallaway, Tennessee — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Gallaway averages can't show:
We read public map data around Gallaway — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Gallaway average
How we know this about Gallaway
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Gallaway’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Gallaway
When does frost risk typically end in Gallaway?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Gallaway typically lands around Mar 7, 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 28.
When is the first frost in Gallaway?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Gallaway typically arrives around Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 9, so the watching starts about Oct 24 — about 261 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Gallaway?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Gallaway sees about 261 frost-free days — roughly Mar 7 through Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 28 to Nov 9, about 226 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Gallaway?
The federal record around Gallaway is a meaningful one — 150 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (99), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 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 Gallaway?
From about Oct 24 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 23 (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 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Gallaway's scale — its 8a band and its 261-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Gallaway'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 Gallaway’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Gallaway's own scale — its own ~261-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,719 acres it covers and 150 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Gallaway's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Gallaway's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 7 and Nov 23 and the ~261-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 150 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Gallaway, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Gallaway's boundary and the 3,719 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~261-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Gallaway's own centroid, the Mississippi Valley Loess PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Gallaway 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 Gallaway's 3,719 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Fayette County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Fayette County
- The growing challenges every Tennessee grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Tennessee
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Fayette County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Gallaway's 3,719 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Gallaway you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,719 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 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 Gallaway-wide figureread your own land →