Perryville, 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.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Perryville, 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 Perryville 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 Perryville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Perryville — the short answer
Perryville, Kentucky: USDA zone 7a, about 223 days between hard freezes, across 500 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~223
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 500 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 Perryville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Perryville's 223-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Perryville
Each reading below is measured for Perryville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPerryville runs about 223 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
MeasuredPerryville 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 Perryville is in
Perryville sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Perryville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Boyle County.
What Grows in Perryville
Every plant below cleared Perryville's own zone 7a and its 223-day season. Each card opens that plant's Kentucky profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Perryville?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 29 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 7 — 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 Perryville
Survey cells within 31 miles of Perryville checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 75 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Perryville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Perryville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Mr Mizer Food MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 25 ft
- Former Foster Barnes PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- 3Ps Battlefield StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- Perryville WWTPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- DANVILLE CITY WATER WORKSPFAS · 1.7 mi
- PARKSVILLE WATER DISTRICTPFAS · 1.7 mi
- SPRINGFIELD WATER WORKSPFAS · 1.7 mi
- ParkersUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.9 mi
- Maggies MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
- Service Station 231 Dr BP 211Underground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- Ernie Holmans GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.0 mi
- Dorsey GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Perryville'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 Perryville.
Total Sites
200
within ~10 miles of Perryville
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Perryville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Perryville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Perryville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Perryville — PFAS (5 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (151 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 Perryville
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 Perryville average
Your land is one point inside Perryville
Everything above resolves to Perryville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 500 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 Perryville Average
Perryville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Perryville
- ●One soil character for all of Perryville
- ●Frost dates read at Perryville's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Perryville's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Perryville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Perryville, Kentucky — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Perryville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Perryville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Perryville average
How we know this about Perryville
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 Perryville’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 Perryville
When does frost risk typically end in Perryville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Perryville typically lands around Mar 29, 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 19.
When is the first frost in Perryville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Perryville typically arrives around Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 24, so the watching starts about Oct 8 — about 223 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Perryville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Perryville sees about 223 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 24, about 188 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Perryville?
The federal record around Perryville is a meaningful one — 200 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (151), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Perryville?
From about Oct 8 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 7 (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 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Perryville's scale — its 7a band and its 223-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Perryville'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 Perryville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Perryville's own scale — its own ~223-day season between 28°F freezes, the 500 acres it covers and 200 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Perryville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Perryville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 29 and Nov 7 and the ~223-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 200 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Perryville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Perryville's boundary and the 500 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~223-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Perryville's own centroid, the Interior PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Perryville 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 Perryville's 500 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Boyle County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Boyle 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 Boyle County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Perryville's 500 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Perryville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 500 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Perryville-wide figureread your own land →
More in Kentucky
Wider growing context
What grows across KentuckyPerryville sits outside our named growing regions, so Kentucky as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides