Spotsylvania County, in Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Spotsylvania County lies within the Piedmont — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Spotsylvania County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Spotsylvania 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 Spotsylvania County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Spotsylvania County — the short answer
Spotsylvania County, Virginia: USDA zone 7a, about 224 days between hard freezes, across 257K acres.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~224
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 257K 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 7a is Spotsylvania County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Spotsylvania County's 224-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Spotsylvania County
Across a year, Spotsylvania County accumulates about 3,796 growing degree days above 50°F, about 62 more than the middle Virginia county — ahead of 71 of Virginia’s 133 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 2,433 hours below 45°F, 5 fewer than the Virginia middle of 2,438. 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 Spotsylvania County
Across Spotsylvania County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Appling, Wedowee, and Nason are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.0–5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
27%
Hydric soils
12%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Spotsylvania County
The USDA soil survey maps 64% of Spotsylvania County as well drained — but another 31% drains differently: 14% poorly drained, 10% moderately well drained.
Appling is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Wedowee (8%) and Nason (8%).
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 Spotsylvania County
Each reading below is measured for Spotsylvania 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 Spotsylvania County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — 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 Spotsylvania County runs about pH 5.0–5.5, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredSpotsylvania County runs about 224 days between hard freezes — 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
MeasuredSpotsylvania County sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Spotsylvania County is in
Spotsylvania County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Piedmont (80%) and Southeastern Plains (20%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Spotsylvania County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Spotsylvania County's own USDA zone 7a and its own 224-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 Virginia profile.
Is it too late to plant in Spotsylvania County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Spotsylvania County
Spotted lanternfly documented 9 miles from Spotsylvania County, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle3 documented records
- monarch butterfly26 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Spotsylvania County
USGS estimates 13,826 lb of Glyphosate on Spotsylvania County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (5,633 lb) and Metolachlor-s (4,323 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 Spotsylvania County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Spotsylvania County — 400 documented sites across 7 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Superfund site. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Spotsylvania County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Spotsylvania County
Closest first, across Spotsylvania County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SPOTSYLVANIA HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- Post Oak SupermarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- QUARLES PETROLEUM INCBrownfields · 1.7 mi
- VA DEPT OF TRANSPORTATION POST OAKBrownfields · 2.7 mi
- VDOT Post Oak Area HeadquartersUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- FLYTHE WM JRUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- Everett Jones Lumber CorporationUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- E B FINNEY & DAUGHTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.8 mi
- CRUMPS WELL CONTAMINATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- J H Chewning Grocery CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- SPOTSYLVANIA SCHOOL BUS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- SPOTSYLVANIA COUNTY SCHOOL BOARD/MAINTENANCE COMPLEXBrownfields · 3.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Spotsylvania 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 Spotsylvania County.
Sources Checked
across Spotsylvania County
Severity Distribution
across Spotsylvania County
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.
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
Check your specific parcel in Spotsylvania 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 Spotsylvania County average
Your land is one point inside Spotsylvania County
Everything above resolves to Spotsylvania County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 257K 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 Spotsylvania County Average
Spotsylvania County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Spotsylvania County
- ●One soil character for all of Spotsylvania County
- ●Frost dates read at Spotsylvania County's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Spotsylvania County's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Spotsylvania County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Spotsylvania County, Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Spotsylvania County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Spotsylvania County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Spotsylvania County average
How we know this about Spotsylvania 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 Spotsylvania County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Spotsylvania County
When does frost risk typically end in Spotsylvania County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Spotsylvania County typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
How long is the growing season in Spotsylvania County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Spotsylvania County sees about 224 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 23, about 189 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Spotsylvania County?
The federal record around Spotsylvania County runs heavier than most — 400 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (217), the nearest Brownfields record about 1.5 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
Everything above is measured at Spotsylvania County's scale — its 7a band and its 224-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Spotsylvania 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 Virginia's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Spotsylvania County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Spotsylvania County's own scale — its own ~224-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 400 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Spotsylvania County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Spotsylvania County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~224-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Spotsylvania CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 400 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 1.5 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Spotsylvania County's boundary and the 257,243 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~224-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Spotsylvania County spans, Piedmont the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Spotsylvania County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Spotsylvania County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Virginia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Virginia
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Spotsylvania County — the ~224 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 Spotsylvania County's 257,243 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 400 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 Spotsylvania Countyread your own land →