Loving County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
The conditions favor cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Loving County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Loving 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 Loving County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Loving County — the short answer
Loving County, Texas: USDA zone 8a, about 255 days between hard freezes, across 428K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~255
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 428K 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 8a is Loving County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Loving County's 255-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Loving County
Across a year, Loving County accumulates about 5,807 growing degree days above 50°F, about 17 fewer than the middle Texas county — ahead of 122 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 1,441 hours below 45°F, 346 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 Loving County
Across Loving County, the ground is predominantly Aridisols, where Wickett, Sharvana, and Splotter are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a loamy fine sand surface. Topsoil pH runs about 7.2–8.2, slightly alkaline. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Aridisols
Drainage
Well drained
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Loving County
The USDA soil survey maps 98% of Loving County as well drained — but another 2% drains differently: 2% moderately well drained.
Wickett is the most extensive named soil at 20% of mapped acres, then Sharvana (18%) and Splotter (11%).
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 Loving County
Each reading below is measured for Loving 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 Loving 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 Loving County runs about pH 7.2–8.2, 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
MeasuredLoving County runs about 255 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
MeasuredLoving County sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a.
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 Loving County is in
Loving 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 Loving County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Loving County's own USDA zone 8a and its own 255-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 Loving County?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 18 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What gets applied to farmland in Loving County
USGS estimates 2,007 lb of Dicamba on Loving County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Glyphosate (339 lb) and Triclopyr (216 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 Loving County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Loving County — 8 documented sites across 2 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Loving County is light. Growing food here starts from a strong position — a quick pass over the map tells you whether any recorded site sits near your land, and if one does, that's information to plant with, not a reason to stop.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Loving County
Closest first, across Loving County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MARATHON OILCO N MASON CAMPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- ORLA R L435280Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- HOPPER EXXON STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- MENTONE GAS PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 6.0 mi
- LOBO PROCESSING PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 7.2 mi
- LOVING GAS PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 12.6 mi
- TORNADO GAS PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 12.6 mi
Measured from Loving 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 Loving County.
Severity Distribution
across Loving County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
Check your specific parcel in Loving 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 Loving County average
Your land is one point inside Loving County
Everything above resolves to Loving County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 428K 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 Loving County Average
Loving County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Loving County
- ●One soil character for all of Loving County
- ●Frost dates read at Loving County's scale: Mar 8 to Nov 18
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Loving County's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Loving County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Loving County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Loving County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Loving County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Loving County average
How we know this about Loving 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 Loving County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Loving County
When does frost risk typically end in Loving County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Loving County typically lands around Mar 8, 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 29.
How long is the growing season in Loving County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Loving County sees about 255 frost-free days — roughly Mar 8 through Nov 18, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 29 to Nov 4, about 220 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Loving County?
The federal record around Loving County is light — 8 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Toxics Release Inventory entries (5), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
Everything above is measured at Loving County's scale — its 8a band and its 255-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Loving 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 Loving County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Loving County's own scale — its own ~255-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 8 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Loving County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Loving County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~255-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Loving CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 8 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Loving County's boundary and the 428,043 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~255-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Loving County sitting wholly inside the Chihuahuan DesertsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Loving 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 Loving County — the ~255 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 Loving County's 428,043 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 8 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 Loving Countyread your own land →