Mortons Gap, Kentucky, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Mortons Gap, 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 Mortons Gap 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 Mortons Gap — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Mortons Gap — the short answer
Mortons Gap, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 758 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 758 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 Mortons Gap's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Mortons Gap's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Mortons Gap
Each reading below is measured for Mortons Gap itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMortons Gap runs about 232 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
MeasuredMortons Gap 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 Mortons Gap is in
Mortons Gap sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Mortons Gap's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hopkins County.
What Grows in Mortons Gap
Every plant below cleared Mortons Gap's own zone 7a and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Mortons Gap?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 23 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 10 — 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 Mortons Gap
Survey cells within 31 miles of Mortons Gap 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 Mortons Gap
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Mortons Gap. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Pore Ole FreddiesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- Townsells GarargeUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- Former Lees Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- One Stop 11 Food MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Camplin PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- I10A0017Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- Vandiver PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Pilot Travel Center 156Underground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- Hopkins Co Road Department LandfillUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- J-LOK, WEST KENTUCKY FACILITYToxics Release Inventory · 2.6 mi
- J-LOK, WEST KENTUCKY FACILITYBrownfields · 2.6 mi
- Service Station 9-L BP 037Underground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Mortons Gap'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 Mortons Gap.
Total Sites
273
within ~10 miles of Mortons Gap
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Mortons Gap
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Mortons Gap
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Mortons Gap, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Mortons Gap — PFAS (4 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (193 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Mortons Gap
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 Mortons Gap average
Your land is one point inside Mortons Gap
Everything above resolves to Mortons Gap as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 758 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 Mortons Gap Average
Mortons Gap Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Mortons Gap
- ●One soil character for all of Mortons Gap
- ●Frost dates read at Mortons Gap's scale: Mar 23 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Mortons Gap's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Mortons Gap
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Mortons Gap, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Mortons Gap averages can't show:
We read public map data around Mortons Gap — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Mortons Gap average
How we know this about Mortons Gap
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 Mortons Gap’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 Mortons Gap
When does frost risk typically end in Mortons Gap?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Mortons Gap typically lands around Mar 23, 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 13.
When is the first frost in Mortons Gap?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Mortons Gap typically arrives around Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 27, so the watching starts about Oct 11 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Mortons Gap?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Mortons Gap sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 23 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 13 to Oct 27, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Mortons Gap?
The federal record around Mortons Gap is a meaningful one — 273 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (193), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Mortons Gap?
From about Oct 11 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 10 (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 10. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Mortons Gap's scale — its 7a band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Mortons Gap'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 Mortons Gap’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Mortons Gap's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 758 acres it covers and 273 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Mortons Gap's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Mortons Gap's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 23 and Nov 10 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 273 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Mortons Gap, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Mortons Gap's boundary and the 758 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Mortons Gap's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Mortons Gap 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 Mortons Gap's 758 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hopkins County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hopkins 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 Hopkins County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Mortons Gap's 758 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Mortons Gap you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 758 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Mortons Gap-wide figureread your own land →