Bear Creek, Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Bear Creek, 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 Bear Creek 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 Bear Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Bear Creek — the short answer
Bear Creek, Texas: USDA zone 8b, about 289 days between hard freezes, across 730 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 16
- Hays County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 2
- Hays County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~289
- Hays County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 730 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Hays County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Bear Creek's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bear Creek's 289-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bear Creek
Each reading below is measured for Bear Creek itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsBear Creek runs about 289 days between hard freezes (read from Hays County, the closest normal to Bear Creek) — 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
MeasuredBear Creek sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Bear Creek is in
Bear Creek sits in the Edwards Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Bear Creek's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hays County.
What Grows in Bear Creek
Every plant below cleared Bear Creek's own zone 8b and its 289-day season. Each card opens that plant's Texas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bear Creek?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 2 — 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 Bear Creek
Survey cells within 31 miles of Bear Creek checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 628 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Bear Creek
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bear Creek. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JDS MARKET 4Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- BUBBAS COUNTRY STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- AZSRUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- LR-58-49-801Nitrate · 1.9 mi
- LR-58-49-930Nitrate · 2.5 mi
- CEDAR VALLEY GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- SCHMIDT CONSTRUCTIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- TXDOT TRAVIS SOUTH MAINTENANCE FACILITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- YD-58-49-603Nitrate · 2.7 mi
- LR-58-49-903Nitrate · 2.8 mi
- MOMS CONVENIENCE STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.9 mi
- CIRCLE K STORE 2704683Underground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bear Creek'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 Bear Creek.
Total Sites
392
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
12 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bear Creek
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bear Creek, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 122 sites within ~10 miles of Bear Creek. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Bear Creek
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 Bear Creek average
Your land is one point inside Bear Creek
Everything above resolves to Bear Creek as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 730 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Hays County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 town 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 Bear Creek Average
Bear Creek Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Bear Creek
- ●One soil character for all of Bear Creek
- ●Frost dates read at Bear Creek's scale: Feb 16 to Dec 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bear Creek's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bear Creek
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bear Creek, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bear Creek averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bear Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bear Creek average
How we know this about Bear Creek
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Hays County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-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 Bear Creek
When does frost risk typically end in Bear Creek?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bear Creek typically lands around Feb 16, 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 9.
When is the first frost in Bear Creek?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bear Creek typically arrives around Dec 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 18, so the watching starts about Nov 2 — about 289 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bear Creek?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bear Creek sees about 289 frost-free days — roughly Feb 16 through Dec 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 9 to Nov 18, about 254 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bear Creek?
The federal record around Bear Creek is a meaningful one — 392 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (199), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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 Bear Creek?
From about Nov 2 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 Dec 2 (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 Dec 2. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bear Creek's scale — its 8b band and its 289-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bear Creek'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 Bear Creek’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Bear Creek's own scale — the 730 acres it covers and 392 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bear Creek's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 392 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bear Creek, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bear Creek's boundary and the 730 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~289-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bear Creek's own centroid, the Edwards PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Bear Creek checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Bear Creek has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Hays County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bear Creek's 730 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hays County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hays County
- The growing challenges every Texas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Texas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Hays County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bear Creek's 730 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bear Creek you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 730 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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 Bear Creek-wide figureread your own land →
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