Lampasas County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
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.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Lampasas County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lampasas 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 Lampasas County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lampasas County — the short answer
Lampasas County, Texas: USDA zone 8b, about 283 days between hard freezes, across 456K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~283
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 456K 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 Lampasas County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lampasas County's 283-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Lampasas County
Across a year, Lampasas County accumulates about 5,915 growing degree days above 50°F, about 91 more than the middle Texas county — ahead of 140 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 960 hours below 45°F, 135 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 Lampasas County
Across Lampasas County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Brackett, Nuff, and Sunev are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a gravelly clay loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.9–8.2, moderately alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
11%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lampasas County
The USDA soil survey maps 99% of Lampasas County as well drained — but another 1% drains differently: 1% moderately well drained.
Brackett is the most extensive named soil at 42% of mapped acres, then Nuff (6%) and Sunev (5%).
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 Lampasas County
Each reading below is measured for Lampasas 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 Lampasas 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 Lampasas County runs about pH 7.9–8.2, 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
MeasuredLampasas County runs about 283 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
MeasuredLampasas 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 Lampasas County is in
Lampasas County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Cross Timbers (85%) and Edwards Plateau (15%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Lampasas County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lampasas County's own USDA zone 8b and its own 283-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 Lampasas 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 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 19 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 29 — 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 Lampasas County
- monarch butterfly7 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Lampasas County
USGS estimates 4,563 lb of 2,4-d on Lampasas County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Dicamba (1,218 lb) and Glyphosate (1,064 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 Lampasas County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lampasas County — 79 documented sites across 4 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Lampasas 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 Lampasas County
Closest first, across Lampasas County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- A & W GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- JOHNNY WHITEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- HWY 190 & HWY 183Underground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- COUNTRY STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- RUBLEY COUNTRY STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- LOMETA SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- LOMETA ISDUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- KEMPNER STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- LAMPASAS TX VORTACUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- AT&SF RAILWAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- LAMPASAS TOOL HOUSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- TXDOT MAINTENANCE FACILITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lampasas 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 Lampasas County.
Total Sites
79
across Lampasas County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
7 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Lampasas County
Severity Distribution
across Lampasas County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lampasas County, two things run higher than the national average across Lampasas County — Toxics Release Inventory (7 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (66 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Lampasas 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 Lampasas County average
Your land is one point inside Lampasas County
Everything above resolves to Lampasas County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 456K 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 Lampasas County Average
Lampasas County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Lampasas County
- ●One soil character for all of Lampasas County
- ●Frost dates read at Lampasas County's scale: Feb 19 to Nov 29
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lampasas County's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lampasas County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lampasas County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lampasas County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lampasas County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lampasas County average
How we know this about Lampasas 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 Lampasas County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lampasas County
When does frost risk typically end in Lampasas County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lampasas County typically lands around Feb 19, 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 12.
How long is the growing season in Lampasas County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lampasas County sees about 283 frost-free days — roughly Feb 19 through Nov 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 12 to Nov 15, about 248 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lampasas County?
The federal record around Lampasas County shows 79 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (66), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Lampasas County's scale — its 8b band and its 283-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lampasas 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 Lampasas County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Lampasas County's own scale — its own ~283-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 79 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lampasas County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lampasas County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~283-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Lampasas CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 79 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
- Lampasas County's boundary and the 456,018 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~283-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Lampasas County spans, Cross Timbers the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Lampasas County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lampasas 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 Lampasas County — the ~283 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 Lampasas County's 456,018 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 79 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 Lampasas Countyread your own land →