Southampton Meadows, Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Expect cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Southampton Meadows, 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 Southampton Meadows 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 Southampton Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Southampton Meadows — the short answer
Southampton Meadows, Virginia: USDA zone 8a, about 239 days between hard freezes, across 183 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~239
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 183 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 Southampton Meadows's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Southampton Meadows's 239-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Southampton Meadows
Each reading below is measured for Southampton Meadows itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSouthampton Meadows runs about 239 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
MeasuredSouthampton Meadows 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 Southampton Meadows is in
Southampton Meadows sits in the Middle Atlantic Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Southampton Meadows's own centroid rather than borrowed from Southampton County.
What Grows in Southampton Meadows
Every plant below cleared Southampton Meadows's own zone 8a and its 239-day season. Each card opens that plant's Virginia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Southampton Meadows?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 14 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Southampton Meadows
Survey cells within 31 miles of Southampton Meadows checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 33 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Southampton Meadows
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Southampton Meadows. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Faulks Convenience CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- DUCK THRU FOOD STORE #5Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- Duck Thru 5Underground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- DOCKSIDE RESTAURANT MARINAUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- 56A 9 SOW 076ANitrate · 3.3 mi
- Lawrence CliffUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- 55B 39Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- 55B 9Nitrate · 4.2 mi
- FRANKLIN, CITY OFPFAS · 4.4 mi
- APTCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.5 mi
- FRANKLIN ABANDONED CONTAINERSuperfund · 4.7 mi
- Franklin City Public Works & Utilities BldgUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Southampton Meadows'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 Southampton Meadows.
Total Sites
192
within ~10 miles of Southampton Meadows
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Southampton Meadows
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Southampton Meadows
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.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
Check your specific parcel in Southampton Meadows
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 Southampton Meadows average
Your land is one point inside Southampton Meadows
Everything above resolves to Southampton Meadows as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 183 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 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 Southampton Meadows Average
Southampton Meadows Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Southampton Meadows
- ●One soil character for all of Southampton Meadows
- ●Frost dates read at Southampton Meadows's scale: Mar 20 to Nov 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Southampton Meadows's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Southampton Meadows
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Southampton Meadows, Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Southampton Meadows averages can't show:
We read public map data around Southampton Meadows — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Southampton Meadows average
How we know this about Southampton Meadows
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 Southampton Meadows’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 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 Southampton Meadows
When does frost risk typically end in Southampton Meadows?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Southampton Meadows typically lands around Mar 20, 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 10.
When is the first frost in Southampton Meadows?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Southampton Meadows typically arrives around Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 31, so the watching starts about Oct 15 — about 239 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Southampton Meadows?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Southampton Meadows sees about 239 frost-free days — roughly Mar 20 through Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 10 to Oct 31, about 204 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Southampton Meadows?
The federal record around Southampton Meadows is a meaningful one — 192 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (115), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Southampton Meadows?
From about Oct 15 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 14 (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 14. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Southampton Meadows's scale — its 8a band and its 239-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Southampton Meadows'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 Southampton Meadows’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Southampton Meadows's own scale — its own ~239-day season between 28°F freezes, the 183 acres it covers and 192 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Southampton Meadows's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Southampton Meadows's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 20 and Nov 14 and the ~239-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 192 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Southampton Meadows, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Southampton Meadows's boundary and the 183 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~239-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Southampton Meadows's own centroid, the Middle Atlantic Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Southampton Meadows checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Southampton Meadows's 183 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Southampton County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Southampton County
- The growing challenges every Virginia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Virginia
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Southampton County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Southampton Meadows's 183 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Southampton Meadows you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 183 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Southampton Meadows-wide figureread your own land →
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