High Bridge, 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.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in High Bridge, 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 High Bridge 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 High Bridge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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High Bridge — the short answer
High Bridge, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 220 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~220
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 High Bridge's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against High Bridge's 220-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in High Bridge
Each reading below is measured for High Bridge itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHigh Bridge runs about 220 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
MeasuredHigh Bridge 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 High Bridge is in
High Bridge sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at High Bridge's own centroid rather than borrowed from Jessamine County.
What Grows in High Bridge
Every plant below cleared High Bridge's own zone 7a and its 220-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in High Bridge?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — 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 High Bridge
Survey cells within 31 miles of High Bridge checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 63 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near High Bridge
Closest first, within ~10 miles of High Bridge. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Dix Drive StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- WILMORE WATER WORKSPFAS · 2.3 mi
- JESSAMINE CO WATER DISTRICT #1PFAS · 2.3 mi
- Shell Mart Food MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- KY UTILITIES CO - BROWN STATIONToxics Release Inventory · 3.0 mi
- KY UTILITIES CO - BROWN STATIONBrownfields · 3.0 mi
- Ashland Branded Marketing 341 0233908Underground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- F & M Gulf ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- ASBURY UNIVERSITYBrownfields · 3.1 mi
- Asbury UniversityUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
- Wilmore WWTPUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
- KY Utilities Co - Brown StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from High Bridge'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 High Bridge.
Total Sites
244
within ~10 miles of High Bridge
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of High Bridge
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of High Bridge
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around High Bridge, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of High Bridge — PFAS (4 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (184 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in High Bridge
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 High Bridge average
Your land is one point inside High Bridge
Everything above resolves to High Bridge as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 High Bridge Average
High Bridge Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across High Bridge
- ●One soil character for all of High Bridge
- ●Frost dates read at High Bridge's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not High Bridge's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in High Bridge
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in High Bridge, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that High Bridge averages can't show:
We read public map data around High Bridge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the High Bridge average
How we know this about High Bridge
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 High Bridge’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 High Bridge
When does frost risk typically end in High Bridge?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in High Bridge typically lands around Apr 2, 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 23.
When is the first frost in High Bridge?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in High Bridge typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 220 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in High Bridge?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, High Bridge sees about 220 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 25, about 185 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in High Bridge?
The federal record around High Bridge is a meaningful one — 244 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (184), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 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 High Bridge?
From about Oct 9 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 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 Nov 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at High Bridge's scale — its 7a band and its 220-day season. Your yard writes its own version of High Bridge'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 High Bridge’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at High Bridge's own scale — its own ~220-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,395 acres it covers and 244 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- High Bridge's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- High Bridge's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 8 and the ~220-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 244 documented contamination sites on the federal record near High Bridge, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- High Bridge's boundary and the 1,395 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~220-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at High Bridge's own centroid, the Interior PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around High Bridge 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 High Bridge's 1,395 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Jessamine County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Jessamine 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 Jessamine County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among High Bridge's 1,395 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of High Bridge you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,395 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.2 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 High Bridge-wide figureread your own land →
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