Crisfield, Maryland, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Crisfield, 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 Crisfield 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 Crisfield — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Crisfield — the short answer
Crisfield, Maryland: USDA zone 8a, about 276 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Dec 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~276
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City 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 8a is Crisfield's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Crisfield's 276-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Crisfield
Each reading below is measured for Crisfield itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCrisfield runs about 276 days between hard freezes — close to year-round growing.
Frost is rarely the limit here; winter plantings are as real as summer ones, and the harder question is which crops shrug off the summer heat.
Grow cool-season crops through the mild winter, and choose heat-tolerant varieties for the summer beds.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredCrisfield 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 Crisfield is in
Crisfield sits in the Middle Atlantic Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Crisfield's own centroid rather than borrowed from Somerset County.
What Grows in Crisfield
Every plant below cleared Crisfield's own zone 8a and its 276-day season. Each card opens that plant's Maryland profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Crisfield?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 5 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Dec 6 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. And with a calendar this mild, the honest answer is that planting barely stops — winter opens seasons colder regions never see.
Documented around Crisfield
Spotted lanternfly documented 22 miles from Crisfield, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Crisfield
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Crisfield. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- US COAST GUARD STATION CRISFIELDBrownfields · 350 ft
- Crisfield Fishing CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- SO Ec 3Nitrate · 1800 ft
- Crisfield Marine TerminalUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- McCready's Self ServeUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- T & S MarineUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Blue Claw Miniature GolfUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Crisfield Sams TexacoUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Former Dockside Seafood (Marina)Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- Tawes BrothersUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- Herb's CitgoUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- FAMILY DOLLAR #2378Brownfields · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Crisfield'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 Crisfield.
Total Sites
101
within ~10 miles of Crisfield
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Crisfield
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Crisfield
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Crisfield, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Crisfield — CAFO (18 sites) and Nitrate (37 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Crisfield
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 Crisfield average
Your land is one point inside Crisfield
Everything above resolves to Crisfield 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 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 Crisfield Average
Crisfield Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Crisfield
- ●One soil character for all of Crisfield
- ●Frost dates read at Crisfield's scale: Mar 5 to Dec 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Crisfield's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Crisfield
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Crisfield, Maryland — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Crisfield averages can't show:
We read public map data around Crisfield — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Crisfield average
How we know this about Crisfield
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 Crisfield’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 Crisfield
When does frost risk typically end in Crisfield?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Crisfield typically lands around Mar 5, 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 Mar 26.
When is the first frost in Crisfield?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Crisfield typically arrives around Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 22, so the watching starts about Nov 6 — about 276 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Crisfield?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Crisfield sees about 276 frost-free days — roughly Mar 5 through Dec 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Mar 26 to Nov 22, about 241 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Crisfield?
The federal record around Crisfield shows 101 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (40), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Crisfield?
From about Nov 6 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 Dec 6 (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 Dec 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Crisfield's scale — its 8a band and its 276-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Crisfield'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 Crisfield’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Crisfield's own scale — its own ~276-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,111 acres it covers and 101 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Crisfield's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Crisfield's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 5 and Dec 6 and the ~276-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 101 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Crisfield, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Crisfield's boundary and the 1,111 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~276-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Crisfield's own centroid, the Middle Atlantic Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Crisfieldlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Crisfield's 1,111 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Somerset County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Somerset County
- The growing challenges every Maryland grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Maryland
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Somerset County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Crisfield's 1,111 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Crisfield you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,111 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Crisfield-wide figureread your own land →