Galveston County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Galveston County lies within the Gulf Coast — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Galveston County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Galveston 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 Galveston County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Galveston County — the short answer
Galveston County, Texas: USDA zone 10a, about 311 days between hard freezes, across 243K acres.
- USDA zone
- 10a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~311
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 243K 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 10a is Galveston County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Galveston County's 311-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Galveston County
Across a year, Galveston County accumulates about 7,655 growing degree days above 50°F, about 1,831 more than the middle Texas county — ahead of 228 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 0 hours below 45°F, 1,095 fewer 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 Galveston County
Across Galveston County, the ground is predominantly Entisols, where Lake Charles, Bernard, and Maggies are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally somewhat poorly drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.4–7.8, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Entisols
Drainage
Somewhat poorly drained
Prime farmland
22%
Hydric soils
50%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Galveston County
The USDA soil survey maps 26% of Galveston County as somewhat poorly drained — but another 45% drains differently: 16% moderately well drained, 16% subaqueous.
Lake Charles is the most extensive named soil at 11% of mapped acres, then Bernard (10%) and Maggies (9%).
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 Galveston County
Each reading below is measured for Galveston 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 Galveston County are somewhat poorly drained, in hydrologic group D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Galveston County runs about pH 6.4–7.8, 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
MeasuredGalveston County runs about 311 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
MeasuredGalveston County sits in USDA hardiness zone 10a.
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 Galveston County is in
Galveston County sits in the Western Gulf Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Galveston County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Galveston County's own USDA zone 10a and its own 311-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 Galveston County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 27 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
Documented around Galveston County
- monarch butterfly472 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Galveston County
USGS estimates 5,616 lb of Glyphosate on Galveston County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (5,608 lb) and Metolachlor-s (2,203 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 Galveston County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Galveston County — 995 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 11 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Galveston County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Galveston County
Closest first, across Galveston County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JAXUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- GULF BREEZE CONVEIENCE STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- LUCKY WAY FOOD STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- SULLIVAN ENTERPRISESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- DOLPHIN WORLDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- GALVESTON ISLAND MUNGOLF COURSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- SAMS MARKET PLACEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.9 mi
- GALVESTON ISD TRANS DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- EVERGREEN HELICOPTERS OF ALASKAUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- T & T MARINE SALVAGEBrownfields · 3.2 mi
- VI-TEX PACKAGING INCToxics Release Inventory · 3.3 mi
- WEST END FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Galveston 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 Galveston County.
Sources Checked
across Galveston County
Severity Distribution
across Galveston County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Galveston County, two things run higher than the national average across Galveston County — PFAS (11 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (683 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Galveston 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 Galveston County average
Your land is one point inside Galveston County
Everything above resolves to Galveston County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 243K 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 Galveston County Average
Galveston County Average
- ●USDA Zones 10a, averaged across Galveston County
- ●One soil character for all of Galveston County
- ●Frost dates read at Galveston County's scale: Jan 20 to Nov 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Galveston County's 10a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Galveston County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Galveston County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Galveston County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Galveston County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Galveston County average
How we know this about Galveston 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 Galveston County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Galveston County
When does frost risk typically end in Galveston County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Galveston County typically lands around Jan 20, 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 Feb 10.
How long is the growing season in Galveston County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Galveston County sees about 311 frost-free days — roughly Jan 20 through Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 10 to Nov 13, about 276 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Galveston County?
The federal record around Galveston County runs heavier than most — 995 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (683), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.9 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
Everything above is measured at Galveston County's scale — its 10a band and its 311-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Galveston 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 Galveston County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Galveston County's own scale — its own ~311-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 995 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Galveston County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Galveston County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~311-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Galveston CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 995 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.9 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Galveston County's boundary and the 242,824 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 10a and a ~311-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Galveston County sitting wholly inside the Western Gulf Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Galveston County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Galveston 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 Galveston County — the ~311 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 Galveston County's 242,824 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 995 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 Galveston Countyread your own land →