Lake Medina Shores, Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with okra, black-eyed pea, tomato, and jalapeno — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Lake Medina Shores, 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 Lake Medina Shores 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 Lake Medina Shores — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Lake Medina Shores — the short answer
Lake Medina Shores, Texas: USDA zone 9a, about 264 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 9a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 4
- Bandera County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 23
- Bandera County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~264
- Bandera County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 Bandera County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9a is Lake Medina Shores's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lake Medina Shores's 264-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lake Medina Shores
Each reading below is measured for Lake Medina Shores itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsLake Medina Shores runs about 264 days between hard freezes (read from Bandera County, the closest normal to Lake Medina Shores) — 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
MeasuredLake Medina Shores 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 Lake Medina Shores is in
Lake Medina Shores sits in the Edwards Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Lake Medina Shores's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bandera County.
What Grows in Lake Medina Shores
Plants matched to Lake Medina Shores's USDA zones 9a, ordered by how much hardiness margin each has here — the ones with room to spare at both ends of this town's band lead. Each links to its full growing profile.
Is it too late to plant in Lake Medina Shores?
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 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 23 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
What's on the federal record near Lake Medina Shores
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lake Medina Shores. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AS-68-17-716Nitrate · 1.6 mi
- TD-69-32-303Nitrate · 3.1 mi
- EZ MART 4379Underground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- BIGS 306Underground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- AS-69-24-802Nitrate · 4.5 mi
- EZ MART 591Underground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
- AS-69-24-803Nitrate · 4.6 mi
- D & H AUTOMOTIVEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.0 mi
- AS-69-24-208Nitrate · 6.1 mi
- AS-68-25-505Nitrate · 6.1 mi
- AS-69-24-304Nitrate · 6.1 mi
- TD-68-25-402Nitrate · 6.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lake Medina Shores'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 Lake Medina Shores.
Total Sites
68
within ~10 miles of Lake Medina Shores
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 brownfield sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lake Medina Shores
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lake Medina Shores
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lake Medina Shores, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 46 sites within ~10 miles of Lake Medina Shores. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Lake Medina Shores
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 Lake Medina Shores average
Your land is one point inside Lake Medina Shores
Everything above resolves to Lake Medina Shores as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 2K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Bandera 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 Lake Medina Shores Average
Lake Medina Shores Average
- ●USDA Zones 9a, averaged across Lake Medina Shores
- ●One soil character for all of Lake Medina Shores
- ●Frost dates read at Lake Medina Shores's scale: Mar 4 to Nov 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lake Medina Shores's 9a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lake Medina Shores
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lake Medina Shores, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lake Medina Shores averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lake Medina Shores — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lake Medina Shores average
How we know this about Lake Medina Shores
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 Bandera 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 Lake Medina Shores
When does frost risk typically end in Lake Medina Shores?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Medina Shores typically lands around Mar 4, 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 25.
When is the first frost in Lake Medina Shores?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Medina Shores typically arrives around Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 9, so the watching starts about Oct 24 — about 264 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lake Medina Shores?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lake Medina Shores sees about 264 frost-free days — roughly Mar 4 through Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 25 to Nov 9, about 229 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lake Medina Shores?
The federal record around Lake Medina Shores shows 68 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (46), the nearest Nitrate record about 1.6 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Lake Medina Shores?
From about Oct 24 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 23 (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 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lake Medina Shores's scale — its 9a band and its 264-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lake Medina Shores'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 Lake Medina Shores’s own scale
4 of the readings below were taken at Lake Medina Shores's own scale — the 1,979 acres it covers and 68 documented sites around it; 6 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lake Medina Shores's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9aUSDA PHZM 2023
- 68 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lake Medina Shores, the closest Nitrate record about 1.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lake Medina Shores's boundary and the 1,979 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- The ecoregion at Lake Medina Shores's own centroid, the Edwards PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Lake Medina Shores has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Bandera County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lake Medina Shores's 1,979 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bandera County
- The candidate plant list — Texas's curated set, filtered to this zone band and re-ordered by how much margin each has herefrom Texas
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bandera 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 Bandera County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lake Medina Shores's 1,979 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lake Medina Shores you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,979 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 1.6 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 Lake Medina Shores-wide figureread your own land →
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