Lee County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — artichoke, fig, california poppy, and cabbage — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Lee County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lee 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 Lee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lee County — the short answer
Lee County, Texas: USDA zone 9a, about 296 days between hard freezes, across 403K acres.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~296
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 403K 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 9a is Lee County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lee County's 296-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Lee County
Across a year, Lee County accumulates about 6,659 growing degree days above 50°F, about 835 more than the middle Texas county — ahead of 191 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 633 hours below 45°F, 462 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 Lee County
Across Lee County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Padina, Tabor, and Zack are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a fine sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.8–6.5, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
15%
Hydric soils
1%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lee County
The USDA soil survey maps 57% of Lee County as moderately well drained — but another 42% drains differently: 37% well drained, 4% somewhat poorly drained.
Padina is the most extensive named soil at 9% of mapped acres, then Tabor (9%) and Zack (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 Lee County
Each reading below is measured for Lee 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 Lee County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group D — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Lee County runs about pH 5.8–6.5, 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
MeasuredLee County runs about 296 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
MeasuredLee County sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a.
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 Lee County is in
Lee County sits in the East Central Texas Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Lee County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lee County's own USDA zone 9a and its own 296-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 Lee County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 4 — 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 Lee County
- monarch butterfly12 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Lee County
USGS estimates 13,828 lb of 2,4-d on Lee County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Glyphosate (4,407 lb) and Atrazine (1,220 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 Lee County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lee County — 155 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 10 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Lee 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 Lee County
Closest first, across Lee County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ELM CREEK CAFEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- GIDDINGS AREA SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- LINCOLN PIT STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- TEXAS HOT OILERSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- N AUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- C C PARKER & SONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- BOBBY LEHMANNUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- DUB DIXSON SHOPPING CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- A W HERTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- LEXINGTON RSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- WALCH STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- GIDDINGS MICROWAVE TOWERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lee 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 Lee County.
Total Sites
155
across Lee County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
10 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Lee County
Severity Distribution
across Lee County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lee County, two things run higher than the national average across Lee County — Toxics Release Inventory (10 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (98 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 Lee 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 Lee County average
Your land is one point inside Lee County
Everything above resolves to Lee County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 403K 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 Lee County Average
Lee County Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Lee County
- ●One soil character for all of Lee County
- ●Frost dates read at Lee County's scale: Feb 11 to Dec 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lee County's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lee County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lee County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lee County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lee County average
How we know this about Lee 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 Lee County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lee County
When does frost risk typically end in Lee County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lee County typically lands around Feb 11, 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 4.
How long is the growing season in Lee County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lee County sees about 296 frost-free days — roughly Feb 11 through Dec 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 4 to Nov 20, about 261 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lee County?
The federal record around Lee County shows 155 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (98), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 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 Lee County's scale — its 9a band and its 296-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lee 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 Lee County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Lee County's own scale — its own ~296-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 155 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lee County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lee County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~296-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Lee CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 155 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Lee County's boundary and the 402,597 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~296-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Lee County sitting wholly inside the East Central Texas PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Lee County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lee 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 Lee County — the ~296 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 Lee County's 402,597 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 155 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 Lee Countyread your own land →