Jeff Davis County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, prickly pear, 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.
Jeff Davis County lies within the Trans-Pecos / Big Bend — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Jeff Davis County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Jeff Davis County — the short answer
Jeff Davis County, Texas: USDA zone 7b, about 224 days between hard freezes, across 1.4M acres.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~224
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 1.4M 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 7b is Jeff Davis County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Jeff Davis County's 224-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Jeff Davis County
Across a year, Jeff Davis County accumulates about 3,395 growing degree days above 50°F, about 2,429 fewer than the middle Texas county — no other Texas county banks fewer. 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 1,912 hours below 45°F, 817 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 Jeff Davis County
Across Jeff Davis County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Brewster, Musquiz, and Redona are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a very gravelly loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.0–7.9, slightly alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Jeff Davis County
The USDA soil survey maps 76% of Jeff Davis County as well drained — but another 4% drains differently: 4% moderately well drained.
Brewster is the most extensive named soil at 25% of mapped acres, then Musquiz (9%) and Redona (7%).
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 Jeff Davis County
Each reading below is measured for Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County runs about pH 7.0–7.9, on the alkaline side.
Many vegetables cope, but acid-lovers like blueberries struggle, and iron and manganese lock up above about pH 7.5 — leaves yellow between the veins even in rich soil.
Elemental sulfur and generous organic matter lower pH slowly for the beds that need it; test first so you add only what the soil actually calls for.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredJeff Davis County runs about 224 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
MeasuredJeff Davis County 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 Jeff Davis County is in
Jeff Davis County sits in the Chihuahuan Deserts — EPA Level III, inside the wider North American Deserts. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Jeff Davis County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Jeff Davis County's own USDA zone 7b and its own 224-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 Jeff Davis County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 10 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Jeff Davis County
- monarch butterfly58 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Jeff Davis County
USGS estimates 6,090 lb of Glyphosate on Jeff Davis County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Dicamba (4,891 lb) and 2,4-d (1,882 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 Jeff Davis County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Jeff Davis County — 21 documented sites across 4 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 mining site. Historic and active mines that may leach heavy metals like arsenic, lead, and cadmium.
The federal record across Jeff Davis County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Jeff Davis County
Closest first, across Jeff Davis County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- DAVIS MOUNTAINS STATE PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- D S BAEZAUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- ANTELOPE VALLEY FARMSUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- ALICIA BARRAGANUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- MCDONALD OBSERVATORYUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- SPTCO WORK CAMPUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- STAGE WEST TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.9 mi
- FORT DAVIS GASCARD 160404Underground Storage Tanks · 17.9 mi
- STONE VILLAGE GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 18.0 mi
- BENCOMOS EXXON 160414Underground Storage Tanks · 18.1 mi
- PORTERS THRIFTWAY 160416Underground Storage Tanks · 18.2 mi
- FAMILY DOLLAR #10487Brownfields · 19.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County.
Sources Checked
across Jeff Davis County
Severity Distribution
across Jeff Davis County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
Check your specific parcel in Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County average
Your land is one point inside Jeff Davis County
Everything above resolves to Jeff Davis County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 1.4M 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 Jeff Davis County Average
Jeff Davis County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Jeff Davis County
- ●One soil character for all of Jeff Davis County
- ●Frost dates read at Jeff Davis County's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Jeff Davis County's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Jeff Davis County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Jeff Davis County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Jeff Davis County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Jeff Davis County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Jeff Davis County average
How we know this about Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Jeff Davis County
When does frost risk typically end in Jeff Davis County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Jeff Davis County typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
How long is the growing season in Jeff Davis County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Jeff Davis County sees about 224 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Oct 27, about 189 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Jeff Davis County?
The federal record around Jeff Davis County shows 21 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (13), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 6.9 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Jeff Davis County's scale — its 7b band and its 224-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Jeff Davis County's own scale — its own ~224-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 21 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Jeff Davis County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Jeff Davis County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~224-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Jeff Davis CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 21 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 6.9 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Jeff Davis County's boundary and the 1,449,314 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~224-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Jeff Davis County sitting wholly inside the Chihuahuan DesertsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Jeff Davis County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Jeff Davis 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 Jeff Davis County — the ~224 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 Jeff Davis County's 1,449,314 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 21 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 Jeff Davis Countyread your own land →