Greenback, Tennessee, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Greenback, 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 Greenback 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 Greenback — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Greenback — the short answer
Greenback, Tennessee: USDA zone 7b, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 5K 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 7b is Greenback's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Greenback's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Greenback
Each reading below is measured for Greenback itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGreenback runs about 243 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
MeasuredGreenback sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Greenback is in
Greenback sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Greenback's own centroid rather than borrowed from Loudon County.
What Grows in Greenback
Every plant below cleared Greenback's own zone 7b and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's Tennessee profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Greenback?
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 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 19 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 17 — 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 Greenback
Survey cells within 31 miles of Greenback 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 Greenback
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Greenback. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Gourley's StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- SUPRA SPORTS INCToxics Release Inventory · 0.8 mi
- AgCentral Farmers Cooperative - GreenbackUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Greenback Farmers Co-opUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Kings Auto PartsUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Fields AmocoUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- RECKLESS INDUSTRIES MOLD DIVISION LLCToxics Release Inventory · 0.9 mi
- Delmar Davis Ser CtrUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- ACUPOWDER TN LLCToxics Release Inventory · 1.0 mi
- Greenback IndustriesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Greenback Corner Market and Deli, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Greenback Vol Fire Dept IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Greenback'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 Greenback.
Total Sites
148
within ~10 miles of Greenback
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
3 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Greenback
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Greenback
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Greenback, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Greenback — Toxics Release Inventory (21 sites) and Superfund (3 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.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Greenback
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 Greenback average
Your land is one point inside Greenback
Everything above resolves to Greenback as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 5K 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 Greenback Average
Greenback Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Greenback
- ●One soil character for all of Greenback
- ●Frost dates read at Greenback's scale: Mar 19 to Nov 17
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Greenback's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Greenback
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Greenback, Tennessee — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Greenback averages can't show:
We read public map data around Greenback — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Greenback average
How we know this about Greenback
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 Greenback’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 Greenback
When does frost risk typically end in Greenback?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Greenback typically lands around Mar 19, 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 9.
When is the first frost in Greenback?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Greenback typically arrives around Nov 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 3, so the watching starts about Oct 18 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Greenback?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Greenback sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 19 through Nov 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 9 to Nov 3, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Greenback?
The federal record around Greenback is a meaningful one — 148 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (81), 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 Greenback?
From about Oct 18 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 17 (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 17. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Greenback's scale — its 7b band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Greenback'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 Greenback’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Greenback's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,319 acres it covers and 148 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Greenback's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Greenback's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 19 and Nov 17 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 148 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Greenback, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Greenback's boundary and the 5,319 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Greenback's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Greenback 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 Greenback's 5,319 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Loudon County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Loudon 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 Loudon County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Greenback's 5,319 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Greenback you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,319 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 Greenback-wide figureread your own land →
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