Port Tobacco Village, Maryland, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Expect cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Port Tobacco Village, 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 Port Tobacco Village 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 Port Tobacco Village — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Port Tobacco Village — the short answer
Port Tobacco Village, Maryland: USDA zone 7b, about 237 days between hard freezes, across 118 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- 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 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~237
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 118 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 7b is Port Tobacco Village's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Port Tobacco Village's 237-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Port Tobacco Village
Each reading below is measured for Port Tobacco Village itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPort Tobacco Village runs about 237 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
MeasuredPort Tobacco Village sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Port Tobacco Village is in
Port Tobacco Village sits in the Southeastern Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Port Tobacco Village's own centroid rather than borrowed from Charles County.
What Grows in Port Tobacco Village
Every plant below cleared Port Tobacco Village's own zone 7b and its 237-day season. Each card opens that plant's Maryland profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Port Tobacco Village?
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 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Port Tobacco Village
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from Port Tobacco Village, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Port Tobacco Village
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Port Tobacco Village. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CH Cd 56Nitrate · 2300 ft
- CH Cd 55Nitrate · 2300 ft
- CH Cd 83Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- CH Cd 59Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- CH Cd 58Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- CH Cd 57Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- Compton Bus Services, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- CH Cd 60Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- CH Cd 84Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- CH Cd 9Nitrate · 1.0 mi
- Port Tobacco MarinaUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- LaPlata Cell SiteUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Port Tobacco Village'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 Port Tobacco Village.
Total Sites
461
within ~10 miles of Port Tobacco Village
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Port Tobacco Village
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Port Tobacco Village
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Port Tobacco Village, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Port Tobacco Village — PFAS (6 sites) and Nitrate (133 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.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Port Tobacco Village
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 Port Tobacco Village average
Your land is one point inside Port Tobacco Village
Everything above resolves to Port Tobacco Village as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 118 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 Port Tobacco Village Average
Port Tobacco Village Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Port Tobacco Village
- ●One soil character for all of Port Tobacco Village
- ●Frost dates read at Port Tobacco Village's scale: Mar 23 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Port Tobacco Village's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Port Tobacco Village
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Port Tobacco Village, Maryland — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Port Tobacco Village averages can't show:
We read public map data around Port Tobacco Village — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Port Tobacco Village average
How we know this about Port Tobacco Village
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 Port Tobacco Village’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 Port Tobacco Village
When does frost risk typically end in Port Tobacco Village?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Port Tobacco Village 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 Port Tobacco Village?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Port Tobacco Village typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 237 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Port Tobacco Village?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Port Tobacco Village sees about 237 frost-free days — roughly Mar 23 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 13 to Nov 1, about 202 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Port Tobacco Village?
The federal record around Port Tobacco Village is a meaningful one — 461 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (215), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.4 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 Port Tobacco Village?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Port Tobacco Village's scale — its 7b band and its 237-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Port Tobacco Village'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 Port Tobacco Village’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Port Tobacco Village's own scale — its own ~237-day season between 28°F freezes, the 118 acres it covers and 461 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Port Tobacco Village's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Port Tobacco Village's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 23 and Nov 15 and the ~237-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 461 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Port Tobacco Village, the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Port Tobacco Village's boundary and the 118 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~237-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Port Tobacco Village's own centroid, the Southeastern PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Port Tobacco Villagelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Port Tobacco Village's 118 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Charles County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Charles 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 Charles County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Port Tobacco Village's 118 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Port Tobacco Village you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 118 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 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 Port Tobacco Village-wide figureread your own land →
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