McKenzie, Tennessee, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in McKenzie, 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 McKenzie 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 McKenzie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
McKenzie — the short answer
McKenzie, Tennessee: USDA zone 7b, about 230 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~230
- 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 7b is McKenzie's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against McKenzie's 230-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in McKenzie
Each reading below is measured for McKenzie itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMcKenzie runs about 230 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
MeasuredMcKenzie 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 McKenzie is in
McKenzie sits in the Southeastern Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at McKenzie's own centroid rather than borrowed from Carroll County.
What Grows in McKenzie
Every plant below cleared McKenzie's own zone 7b and its 230-day season. Each card opens that plant's Tennessee profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in McKenzie?
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 24; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 24 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — 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.
What's on the federal record near McKenzie
Closest first, within ~10 miles of McKenzie. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Casey's General Store No 3394Underground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- Kerr Mcgee #6394Underground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- Gaines Manfacturing Co IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- Eagle Food StoresUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- Bi-rite 205Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- Wilson Gulf (bubba's Bp)Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- BETHEL COLLEGE CUMBERLAND PRESBYTERIAN COLLEGEBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- Cornerstone MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- CR:Q-006Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- Bates Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- TDOT - DISTRICT 41 - MCKENZIEBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- TDOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from McKenzie'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 McKenzie.
Total Sites
105
within ~10 miles of McKenzie
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of McKenzie
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of McKenzie
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around McKenzie, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of McKenzie — CAFO (5 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (12 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in McKenzie
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 McKenzie average
Your land is one point inside McKenzie
Everything above resolves to McKenzie 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 McKenzie Average
McKenzie Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across McKenzie
- ●One soil character for all of McKenzie
- ●Frost dates read at McKenzie's scale: Mar 24 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not McKenzie's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in McKenzie
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in McKenzie, Tennessee — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that McKenzie averages can't show:
We read public map data around McKenzie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the McKenzie average
How we know this about McKenzie
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 McKenzie’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 McKenzie
When does frost risk typically end in McKenzie?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in McKenzie typically lands around Mar 24, 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 14.
When is the first frost in McKenzie?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in McKenzie typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 230 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in McKenzie?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, McKenzie sees about 230 frost-free days — roughly Mar 24 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 14 to Oct 26, about 195 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in McKenzie?
The federal record around McKenzie is a meaningful one — 105 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (64), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 McKenzie?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at McKenzie's scale — its 7b band and its 230-day season. Your yard writes its own version of McKenzie'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 McKenzie’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at McKenzie's own scale — its own ~230-day season between 28°F freezes, the 4,076 acres it covers and 105 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- McKenzie's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- McKenzie's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 24 and Nov 9 and the ~230-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 105 documented contamination sites on the federal record near McKenzie, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- McKenzie's boundary and the 4,076 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~230-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at McKenzie's own centroid, the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so McKenzie's 4,076 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Carroll County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Carroll 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 Carroll County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among McKenzie's 4,076 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of McKenzie you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 4,076 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 McKenzie-wide figureread your own land →