Vidor, Texas, sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
A short list that earns its place here — okra, meyer lemon, california poppy, and artichoke — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Vidor, 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 Vidor 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 Vidor — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Vidor — the short answer
Vidor, Texas: USDA zone 9b, about 312 days between hard freezes, across 8K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 9b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Jan 30
- Orange County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 8
- Orange County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~312
- Orange County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- City area
- 8K 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 Orange County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 9b is Vidor's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Vidor's 312-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Vidor
Each reading below is measured for Vidor itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsVidor runs about 312 days between hard freezes (read from Orange County, the closest normal to Vidor) — 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
MeasuredVidor sits in USDA hardiness zone 9b.
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 Vidor is in
Vidor sits in the Western Gulf Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Vidor's own centroid rather than borrowed from Orange County.
What Grows in Vidor
Every plant below cleared Vidor's own zone 9b and its 312-day season. Each card opens that plant's Texas profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Vidor?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Jan 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Jan 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 8 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Vidor
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Vidor. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- COUNTRY PANTRY 11Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- COUNTRY PANTRY 10Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- NOLANS FOOD STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- I 10 FUELMART ETCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- PCT 4 BARNUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- TRUCK WORKSBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- VIDOR DUMPINGSuperfund · 0.8 mi
- ST AUTOMOTIVEBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- UJ-61-56-902Nitrate · 0.8 mi
- VIDOR HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- VIDOR ISDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- VIDOR ISDBrownfields · 0.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Vidor'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 Vidor.
Total Sites
1,008
within ~10 miles of Vidor
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Vidor
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Vidor
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Vidor
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 Vidor average
Your land is one point inside Vidor
Everything above resolves to Vidor as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 8K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Orange County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this city’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 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 Vidor Average
Vidor Average
- ●USDA Zones 9b, averaged across Vidor
- ●One soil character for all of Vidor
- ●Frost dates read at Vidor's scale: Jan 30 to Dec 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Vidor's 9b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Vidor
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Vidor, Texas — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Vidor averages can't show:
We read public map data around Vidor — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Vidor average
How we know this about Vidor
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 Orange 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 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 Vidor
When does frost risk typically end in Vidor?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Vidor typically lands around Jan 30, 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 Feb 20.
When is the first frost in Vidor?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Vidor typically arrives around Dec 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 24, so the watching starts about Nov 8 — about 312 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Vidor?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Vidor sees about 312 frost-free days — roughly Jan 30 through Dec 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Feb 20 to Nov 24, about 277 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Vidor?
The federal record around Vidor is a meaningful one — 1,008 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (584), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Vidor?
From about Nov 8 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 Dec 8 (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 Dec 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Vidor's scale — its 9b band and its 312-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Vidor'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 Vidor’s own scale
5 of the readings below were taken at Vidor's own scale — the 7,690 acres it covers and 1,008 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Vidor's own USDA hardiness band, zones 9bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 1,008 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Vidor, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Vidor's boundary and the 7,690 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 9b and a ~312-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Vidor's own centroid, the Western Gulf Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Vidor has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Orange County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Vidor's 7,690 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Orange County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Orange 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 Orange County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Vidor's 7,690 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Vidor you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 7,690 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Vidor-wide figureread your own land →
More in Texas
Wider growing context
What grows across TexasVidor sits outside our named growing regions, so Texas as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides