South Pittsburg, 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.
The conditions favor cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in South Pittsburg, 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 South Pittsburg 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 South Pittsburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
South Pittsburg — the short answer
South Pittsburg, Tennessee: USDA zone 7b, about 239 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~239
- 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 South Pittsburg's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against South Pittsburg's 239-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in South Pittsburg
Each reading below is measured for South Pittsburg itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSouth Pittsburg runs about 239 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
MeasuredSouth Pittsburg 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 South Pittsburg is in
South Pittsburg sits in the Southwestern Appalachians — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at South Pittsburg's own centroid rather than borrowed from Marion County.
What Grows in South Pittsburg
Every plant below cleared South Pittsburg's own zone 7b and its 239-day season. Each card opens that plant's Tennessee profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in South Pittsburg?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around South Pittsburg
Survey cells within 31 miles of South Pittsburg checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 76 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near South Pittsburg
Closest first, within ~10 miles of South Pittsburg. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- South Central Spbgtnma Real EstaUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- City Of South PittsburgUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- Grace PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- Marion QuarryUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Marion Natural GasUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Sequatchie Concrete ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Dixie LoggingUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- William PayneUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- J.i. Brown Tree CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Old PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- South Pittsburg National Guard ArmoryUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Quick StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from South Pittsburg'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 South Pittsburg.
Total Sites
172
within ~10 miles of South Pittsburg
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of South Pittsburg
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of South Pittsburg
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around South Pittsburg, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of South Pittsburg — CAFO (4 sites) and PFAS (3 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in South Pittsburg
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 South Pittsburg average
Your land is one point inside South Pittsburg
Everything above resolves to South Pittsburg 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 South Pittsburg Average
South Pittsburg Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across South Pittsburg
- ●One soil character for all of South Pittsburg
- ●Frost dates read at South Pittsburg's scale: Mar 17 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not South Pittsburg's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in South Pittsburg
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in South Pittsburg, Tennessee — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that South Pittsburg averages can't show:
We read public map data around South Pittsburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the South Pittsburg average
How we know this about South Pittsburg
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 South Pittsburg’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 South Pittsburg
When does frost risk typically end in South Pittsburg?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in South Pittsburg typically lands around Mar 17, 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 7.
When is the first frost in South Pittsburg?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in South Pittsburg typically arrives around Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 28, so the watching starts about Oct 12 — about 239 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in South Pittsburg?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, South Pittsburg sees about 239 frost-free days — roughly Mar 17 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 7 to Oct 28, about 204 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in South Pittsburg?
The federal record around South Pittsburg is a meaningful one — 172 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (108), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 South Pittsburg?
From about Oct 12 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 11 (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 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at South Pittsburg's scale — its 7b band and its 239-day season. Your yard writes its own version of South Pittsburg'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 South Pittsburg’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at South Pittsburg's own scale — its own ~239-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,261 acres it covers and 172 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- South Pittsburg's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- South Pittsburg's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 17 and Nov 11 and the ~239-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 172 documented contamination sites on the federal record near South Pittsburg, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- South Pittsburg's boundary and the 5,261 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~239-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at South Pittsburg's own centroid, the Southwestern AppalachiansUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around South Pittsburg 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 South Pittsburg's 5,261 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Marion County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Marion 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 Marion County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among South Pittsburg's 5,261 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of South Pittsburg you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,261 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 South Pittsburg-wide figureread your own land →
More in Tennessee
Growing regions
Nearby growing guides