Kleberg County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Kleberg County lies within the Coastal Bend — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Kleberg County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Kleberg 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 Kleberg County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Kleberg County — the short answer
Kleberg County, Texas: USDA zone 9b, about 316 days between hard freezes, across 564K acres.
- USDA zone
- 9b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~316
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 564K 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 9b is Kleberg County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Kleberg County's 316-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Kleberg County
Across a year, Kleberg County accumulates about 8,303 growing degree days above 50°F, about 2,479 more than the middle Texas county — ahead of 243 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 Kleberg County
Across Kleberg County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Palobia, Victoria, and Colmena are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a fine sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.7–8.1, slightly alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
34%
Hydric soils
14%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Kleberg County
The USDA soil survey maps 39% of Kleberg County as well drained — but another 48% drains differently: 28% moderately well drained, 10% poorly drained.
Palobia is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Victoria (15%) and Colmena (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 Kleberg County
Each reading below is measured for Kleberg 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 Kleberg County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — 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 Kleberg County runs about pH 6.7–8.1, 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
MeasuredKleberg County runs about 316 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
MeasuredKleberg County sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b.
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 Kleberg County is in
Kleberg 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 Kleberg County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Kleberg County's own USDA zone 9b and its own 316-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 Kleberg County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 1 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 14 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. In a climate this gentle, “too late” hardly applies — the question becomes which crops prefer the cooler months ahead.
Documented around Kleberg County
- monarch butterfly2 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Kleberg County
USGS estimates 172,385 lb of Glyphosate on Kleberg County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (75,210 lb) and Metolachlor-s (72,297 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 Kleberg County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Kleberg County — 292 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Kleberg 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 Kleberg County
Closest first, across Kleberg County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- RR-83-35-603Nitrate · 1.4 mi
- KING RANCH NORIAS DIVISIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- CHROMALLOY DRILLING FLUIDSUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- CLARKE WELDINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- VILLAREAL TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- CHAMBERLAIN CEMETERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- FFPUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- THE CROCK POTUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- RIVIERA STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- KING RANCH FEEDMILLUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- KINGSVILLE SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- HABNUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Kleberg 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 Kleberg County.
Total Sites
292
across Kleberg County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
across Kleberg County
Severity Distribution
across Kleberg County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Kleberg County, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 126 sites across Kleberg County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Kleberg 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 Kleberg County average
Your land is one point inside Kleberg County
Everything above resolves to Kleberg County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 564K 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 Kleberg County Average
Kleberg County Average
- ●USDA Zones 9b, averaged across Kleberg County
- ●One soil character for all of Kleberg County
- ●Frost dates read at Kleberg County's scale: Feb 1 to Dec 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Kleberg County's 9b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Kleberg County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Kleberg County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Kleberg County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Kleberg County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Kleberg County average
How we know this about Kleberg 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 Kleberg County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Kleberg County
When does frost risk typically end in Kleberg County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Kleberg County typically lands around Feb 1, 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 22.
How long is the growing season in Kleberg County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Kleberg County sees about 316 frost-free days — roughly Feb 1 through Dec 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 22 to Nov 30, about 281 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Kleberg County?
The federal record around Kleberg County is a meaningful one — 292 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (144), the nearest Nitrate record about 1.4 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.
Everything above is measured at Kleberg County's scale — its 9b band and its 316-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Kleberg 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 Kleberg County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Kleberg County's own scale — its own ~316-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 292 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Kleberg County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Kleberg County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~316-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Kleberg CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 292 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 1.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Kleberg County's boundary and the 564,035 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9b and a ~316-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Kleberg County sitting wholly inside the Western Gulf Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Kleberg County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Kleberg 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 Kleberg County — the ~316 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 Kleberg County's 564,035 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 292 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 Kleberg Countyread your own land →