St. Jo, 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.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in St. Jo, 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 St. Jo 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 St. Jo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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St. Jo — the short answer
St. Jo, Texas: USDA zone 8a, about 263 days between hard freezes, across 689 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~263
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 689 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 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 St. Jo's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against St. Jo's 263-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in St. Jo
Each reading below is measured for St. Jo itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSt. Jo runs about 263 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
MeasuredSt. Jo 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 St. Jo is in
St. Jo sits in the Cross Timbers — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at St. Jo's own centroid rather than borrowed from Montague County.
What Grows in St. Jo
Every plant below cleared St. Jo's own zone 8a and its 263-day season. Each card opens that plant's Texas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in St. Jo?
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 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 6 (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.
What's on the federal record near St. Jo
Closest first, within ~10 miles of St. Jo. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ST JO CENTRAL OFFICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- CITY OF SAINT JOUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- THE GAS STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- OLD STATION VACANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- SAINT JO ISDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- PANTHER PIT STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- CITY OF SAINT JOPFAS · 2.0 mi
- TR-19-20-801Nitrate · 4.8 mi
- WOLF RIDGE WINDBrownfields · 5.8 mi
- SUPERIOR TOOLING PRODUCTSBrownfields · 8.0 mi
- KOUNTRY KORNERUnderground Storage Tanks · 8.4 mi
- RUMBERToxics Release Inventory · 8.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from St. Jo'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 St. Jo.
Total Sites
27
within ~10 miles of St. Jo
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of St. Jo
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of St. Jo
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around St. Jo, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 19 sites within ~10 miles of St. Jo. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in St. Jo
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 St. Jo average
Your land is one point inside St. Jo
Everything above resolves to St. Jo as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 689 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 city 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 St. Jo Average
St. Jo Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across St. Jo
- ●One soil character for all of St. Jo
- ●Frost dates read at St. Jo's scale: Mar 6 to Nov 24
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not St. Jo's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in St. Jo
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in St. Jo, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that St. Jo averages can't show:
We read public map data around St. Jo — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the St. Jo average
How we know this about St. Jo
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at St. Jo’s own record; 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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 St. Jo
When does frost risk typically end in St. Jo?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in St. Jo typically lands around Mar 6, 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 27.
When is the first frost in St. Jo?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in St. Jo typically arrives around Nov 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 10, so the watching starts about Oct 25 — about 263 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in St. Jo?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, St. Jo sees about 263 frost-free days — roughly Mar 6 through Nov 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 27 to Nov 10, about 228 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in St. Jo?
The federal record around St. Jo shows 27 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (19), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 St. Jo?
From about Oct 25 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 24 (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 24. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at St. Jo's scale — its 8a band and its 263-day season. Your yard writes its own version of St. Jo'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 St. Jo’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at St. Jo's own scale — its own ~263-day season between 28°F freezes, the 689 acres it covers and 27 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- St. Jo's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- St. Jo's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 6 and Nov 24 and the ~263-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 27 documented contamination sites on the federal record near St. Jo, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- St. Jo's boundary and the 689 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~263-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at St. Jo's own centroid, the Cross TimbersUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so St. Jo's 689 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Montague County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Montague 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 Montague County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among St. Jo's 689 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of St. Jo you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 689 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 St. Jo-wide figureread your own land →
More in Texas
Wider growing context
What grows across TexasSt. Jo sits outside our named growing regions, so Texas as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides