Cross Plains, Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
These conditions suit cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cross Plains, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Cross Plains lot. 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 Cross Plains — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Cross Plains — the short answer
Cross Plains, Texas: USDA zone 8a, about 255 days between hard freezes, across 768 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 11
- Callahan County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 21
- Callahan County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~255
- Callahan County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 768 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Callahan County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8a is Cross Plains's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cross Plains's 255-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cross Plains
Each reading below is measured for Cross Plains itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsCross Plains runs about 255 days between hard freezes (read from Callahan County, the closest normal to Cross Plains) — 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
MeasuredCross Plains 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 Cross Plains is in
Cross Plains sits in the Cross Timbers — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Cross Plains's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Callahan County is mostly Central Great Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Cross Plains
Every plant below cleared Cross Plains's own zone 8a and its 255-day season. Each card opens that plant's Texas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cross Plains?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 21 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
What's on the federal record near Cross Plains
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cross Plains. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PIONEER OILCO 124Underground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- BYTRITE SUPERETTEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- GRIDER BROTHERS OILUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- FOOD PLAZA 4Underground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- WTGF 230312Underground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- TRIPLE S ROUSTABOUTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- CROSS PLAIN ISDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- BX-30-55-938Nitrate · 2.2 mi
Measured from Cross Plains'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 Cross Plains.
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cross Plains
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Cross Plains
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 Cross Plains average
Your land is one point inside Cross Plains
Everything above resolves to Cross Plains as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 768 acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Callahan County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 town 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 local average.
Your Lot vs the Cross Plains Average
Cross Plains Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Cross Plains
- ●One soil character for all of Cross Plains
- ●Frost dates read at Cross Plains's scale: Mar 11 to Nov 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cross Plains's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cross Plains
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cross Plains, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cross Plains averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cross Plains — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cross Plains average
How we know this about Cross Plains
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this town’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Callahan County’s record, because none resolves here; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at town grain anywhere on this page — there is no town-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Cross Plains
When does frost risk typically end in Cross Plains?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cross Plains typically lands around Mar 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 Apr 1.
When is the first frost in Cross Plains?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cross Plains typically arrives around Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 7, so the watching starts about Oct 22 — about 255 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cross Plains?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cross Plains sees about 255 frost-free days — roughly Mar 11 through Nov 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 1 to Nov 7, about 220 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cross Plains?
The federal record around Cross Plains is light — 9 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (7), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Cross Plains?
From about Oct 22 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 21 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 21. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cross Plains's scale — its 8a band and its 255-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cross Plains's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Cross Plains’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Cross Plains's own scale — the 768 acres it covers and 9 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cross Plains's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 9 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cross Plains, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cross Plains's boundary and the 768 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~255-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Cross Plains sits in the Cross Timbers — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Cross Plains has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Callahan County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cross Plains's 768 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Callahan County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Callahan County
- The growing challenges every Texas grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Texas
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Callahan County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cross Plains's 768 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cross Plains you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 768 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Cross Plains-wide figureread your own land →
More in Texas
Wider growing context
What grows across TexasCross Plains sits outside our named growing regions, so Texas as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides