Erath County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
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.
Erath County lies within the Cross Timbers — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Erath County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Erath County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Erath County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Erath County — the short answer
Erath County, Texas: USDA zone 8b, about 266 days between hard freezes, across 693K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~266
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 693K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 8b is Erath County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Erath County's 266-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Erath County
Across a year, Erath County accumulates about 5,544 growing degree days above 50°F, about 280 fewer than the middle Texas county — ahead of 70 of Texas’s 254 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Winter banks about 1,240 hours below 45°F, 145 more than the Texas middle of 1,095. Chill is what tells a fruit tree its dormancy is over, and it is set by climate rather than by anything you can build.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Erath County
Across Erath County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Purves, Windthorst, and Maloterre are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a fine sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.5–8.1, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
23%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Erath County
The USDA soil survey maps 74% of Erath County as well drained — but another 26% drains differently: 23% moderately well drained, 4% somewhat excessively drained.
Purves is the most extensive named soil at 11% of mapped acres, then Windthorst (10%) and Maloterre (8%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Erath County
Each reading below is measured for Erath County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Erath County are well drained, in hydrologic group D — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Erath County runs about pH 6.5–8.1, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredErath County runs about 266 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
MeasuredErath County 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 Erath County is in
Erath County sits in the Cross Timbers — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Erath County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Erath County's own USDA zone 8b and its own 266-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Texas profile.
Is it too late to plant in Erath County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 2 (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 Erath County
- monarch butterfly25 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Erath County
USGS estimates 14,535 lb of 2,4-d on Erath County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Glyphosate (11,484 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (4,910 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Erath County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Erath County — 248 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 11 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Erath County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Erath County
Closest first, across Erath County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- DUBLIN TX RCAGUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- REEDER OILUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- ERATH CTY PREC 2Underground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- FLAT CITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- MORGAN MILL ISDUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- AT&SF RAILWAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- RAYLOC GENAUT INDUSTRIESUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- ONE STOP 3Underground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- CHARLIES COUNTRY STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- THRIFT WAY 006Underground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- ANSLEYS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- WEATHER SERV METEROOLDGICAL OBSUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Erath County'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 Erath County.
Total Sites
248
across Erath County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
11 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Erath County
Severity Distribution
across Erath County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Erath County, CAFO runs higher than the national average — 89 sites across Erath County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Erath County
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 Erath County average
Your land is one point inside Erath County
Everything above resolves to Erath County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 693K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Erath County Average
Erath County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Erath County
- ●One soil character for all of Erath County
- ●Frost dates read at Erath County's scale: Mar 2 to Nov 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Erath County's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Erath County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Erath County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Erath County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Erath County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Erath County average
How we know this about Erath County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Erath County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Erath County
When does frost risk typically end in Erath County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Erath County typically lands around Mar 2, 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 23.
How long is the growing season in Erath County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Erath County sees about 266 frost-free days — roughly Mar 2 through Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 23 to Nov 9, about 231 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Erath County?
The federal record around Erath County is a meaningful one — 248 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (126), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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.
Everything above is measured at Erath County's scale — its 8b band and its 266-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Erath County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Texas's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Erath County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Erath County's own scale — its own ~266-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 248 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Erath County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Erath County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~266-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Erath CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 248 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile outFederal environmental registers
- Erath County's boundary and the 693,234 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~266-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Erath County sitting wholly inside the Cross TimbersUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Erath County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Erath County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Texas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Texas
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Erath County — the ~266 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Erath County's 693,234 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 248 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Erath Countyread your own land →