Wise County, in Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Wise County lies within the Cross Timbers — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Wise County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Wise 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 Wise County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Wise County — the short answer
Wise County, Texas: USDA zone 8a, about 266 days between hard freezes, across 579K acres.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~266
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 579K 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 Wise County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Wise County's 266-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Wise County
Across a year, Wise County accumulates about 5,716 growing degree days above 50°F, about 108 fewer than the middle Texas county — ahead of 109 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 1,255 hours below 45°F, 160 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 Wise County
Across Wise County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Duffau, Keeter, and Pulexas are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a fine sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.7–7.9, 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 Wise County
The USDA soil survey maps 79% of Wise County as well drained — but another 19% drains differently: 19% moderately well drained.
Duffau is the most extensive named soil at 12% of mapped acres, then Keeter (8%) and Pulexas (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 Wise County
Each reading below is measured for Wise 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 Wise 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 Wise County runs about pH 6.7–7.9, 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
MeasuredWise County runs about 266 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
MeasuredWise 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 Wise County is in
Wise County sits in the Cross Timbers — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Wise County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Wise County's own USDA zone 8a and its own 266-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 Wise County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 24 — 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 Wise County
- monarch butterfly6 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Wise County
USGS estimates 13,114 lb of 2,4-d on Wise County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Glyphosate (12,262 lb) and Dicamba (2,719 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 Wise County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Wise County — 288 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Superfund site (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 Wise 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 Wise County
Closest first, across Wise County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- OLD TEXACO STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- DB SMITH TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- STATE OF TEXASUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- MCCOMIS OILFIELD SERVICESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- C&S CONSTRUCTIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- DANNY J STACKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- HWY 114 KWIK STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- WISE COUNTY PRECINCT 1Underground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- MILLER CHEVROLETUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- MOSS TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- 3-D TRUCKINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- COTTONDALE FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Wise 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 Wise County.
Total Sites
288
across Wise County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Severity Distribution
across Wise County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Wise County, two things run higher than the national average across Wise County — PFAS (4 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (20 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.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Wise 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 Wise County average
Your land is one point inside Wise County
Everything above resolves to Wise County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 579K 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 Wise County Average
Wise County Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Wise County
- ●One soil character for all of Wise County
- ●Frost dates read at Wise County's scale: Mar 3 to Nov 24
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Wise County's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Wise County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Wise County, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Wise County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Wise County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Wise County average
How we know this about Wise 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 Wise County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Wise County
When does frost risk typically end in Wise County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Wise County typically lands around Mar 3, 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 24.
How long is the growing season in Wise County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Wise County sees about 266 frost-free days — roughly Mar 3 through Nov 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 24 to Nov 10, about 231 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Wise County?
The federal record around Wise County is a meaningful one — 288 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (192), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Wise County's scale — its 8a band and its 266-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Wise 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 Wise County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Wise County's own scale — its own ~266-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 288 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Wise County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Wise County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~266-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Wise CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 288 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Wise County's boundary and the 578,850 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~266-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Wise County sitting wholly inside the Cross TimbersUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Wise County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Wise 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 Wise County — the ~266 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 Wise County's 578,850 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 288 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 Wise Countyread your own land →