Centertown, Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Centertown, 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 Centertown 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 Centertown — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Centertown — the short answer
Centertown, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 228 days between hard freezes, across 200 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~228
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 200 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 7a is Centertown's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Centertown's 228-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Centertown
Each reading below is measured for Centertown itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCentertown runs about 228 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
MeasuredCentertown 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 Centertown is in
Centertown sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Centertown's own centroid rather than borrowed from Ohio County.
What Grows in Centertown
Every plant below cleared Centertown's own zone 7a and its 228-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Centertown?
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 26; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 26 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Centertown
Survey cells within 31 miles of Centertown checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 86 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Centertown
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Centertown. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Centertown GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- Fastway #8Underground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- Center Preparation Plant & CentrUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- White PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- H12A0014Nitrate · 1600 ft
- H12A0033Nitrate · 1.2 mi
- Genes GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- Coffman ShellUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
- Alston Surface MineUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- Eastern Storage Alston IvUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- OHIO CO LANDFILLToxics Release Inventory · 3.4 mi
- Barnes Rock Port GulfUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Centertown'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 Centertown.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Centertown
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Centertown
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Centertown, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Centertown — Superfund (5 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (14 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Centertown
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 Centertown average
Your land is one point inside Centertown
Everything above resolves to Centertown as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 200 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 Centertown Average
Centertown Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Centertown
- ●One soil character for all of Centertown
- ●Frost dates read at Centertown's scale: Mar 26 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Centertown's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Centertown
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Centertown, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Centertown averages can't show:
We read public map data around Centertown — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Centertown average
How we know this about Centertown
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 Centertown’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 Centertown
When does frost risk typically end in Centertown?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Centertown typically lands around Mar 26, 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 16.
When is the first frost in Centertown?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Centertown typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 228 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Centertown?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Centertown sees about 228 frost-free days — roughly Mar 26 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 16 to Oct 26, about 193 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Centertown?
The federal record around Centertown is a meaningful one — 168 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (105), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Centertown?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Centertown's scale — its 7a band and its 228-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Centertown'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 Centertown’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Centertown's own scale — its own ~228-day season between 28°F freezes, the 200 acres it covers and 168 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Centertown's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Centertown's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 26 and Nov 9 and the ~228-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 168 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Centertown, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Centertown's boundary and the 200 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~228-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Centertown's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Centertown 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 Centertown's 200 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Ohio County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Ohio County
- The growing challenges every Kentucky grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Kentucky
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Ohio County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Centertown's 200 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Centertown you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 200 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Centertown-wide figureread your own land →