Milam County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
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
Milam County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Milam 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 Milam County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Milam County — the short answer
Milam County, Texas: USDA zone 9a, about 297 days between hard freezes, across 650K acres.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Feb 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~297
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 650K 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 Milam County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Milam County's 297-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Milam County
Across a year, Milam County accumulates about 6,609 growing degree days above 50°F, about 785 more than the middle Texas county — ahead of 189 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 627 hours below 45°F, 468 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 Milam County
Across Milam County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Edge, Padina, and Rader are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a clay surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.5–7.9, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
30%
Hydric soils
0%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Milam County
The USDA soil survey maps 52% of Milam County as well drained — but another 46% drains differently: 46% moderately well drained, 1% somewhat excessively drained.
Edge is the most extensive named soil at 12% of mapped acres, then Padina (11%) and Rader (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 Milam County
Each reading below is measured for Milam 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 Milam 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 Milam County runs about pH 6.5–7.9, 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
MeasuredMilam County runs about 297 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
MeasuredMilam 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 Milam County is in
Milam County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — East Central Texas Plains (54%) and Texas Blackland Prairies (46%). 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 Milam County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Milam County's own USDA zone 9a and its own 297-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 Milam 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 Jan 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Feb 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 2 — 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 Milam County
- monarch butterfly46 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Milam County
USGS estimates 118,135 lb of Glyphosate on Milam County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of 2,4-d (38,662 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (28,901 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 Milam County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Milam County — 148 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Milam 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 Milam County
Closest first, across Milam County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MILAM COUNTY PCNT 1Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- WALLED LAKE DOORUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- ROCKDALE SANDOW & SOUTHERN RRUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- GET N GOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- COUFAL EQUIPMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- MAYSFIELD GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- A W MCCULLENUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- SANDOW STEAM ELECTRIC STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- JEKELS GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HARBUZ GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HOLMES RANCH MILANOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- C & Y GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Milam 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 Milam County.
Total Sites
148
across Milam County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Milam County
Severity Distribution
across Milam County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Milam County, two things run higher than the national average across Milam County — PFAS (3 sites) and CAFO (3 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Milam 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 Milam County average
Your land is one point inside Milam County
Everything above resolves to Milam County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 650K 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 Milam County Average
Milam County Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Milam County
- ●One soil character for all of Milam County
- ●Frost dates read at Milam County's scale: Feb 8 to Dec 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Milam County's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Milam County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Milam County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Milam County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Milam County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Milam County average
How we know this about Milam 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 Milam County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Milam County
When does frost risk typically end in Milam County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Milam County typically lands around Feb 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 1.
How long is the growing season in Milam County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Milam County sees about 297 frost-free days — roughly Feb 8 through Dec 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 1 to Nov 18, about 262 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Milam County?
The federal record around Milam County is a meaningful one — 148 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (112), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 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 Milam County's scale — its 9a band and its 297-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Milam 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 Milam County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Milam County's own scale — its own ~297-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 148 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Milam County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Milam County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~297-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Milam CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 148 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Milam County's boundary and the 650,467 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9a and a ~297-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Milam County spans, East Central Texas Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Milam County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Milam 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 Milam County — the ~297 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 Milam County's 650,467 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 148 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 Milam Countyread your own land →