Clarence Center, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Clarence Center, 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 Clarence Center 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 Clarence Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Clarence Center — the short answer
Clarence Center, New York: USDA zone 6a, about 214 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- 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
- ~214
- 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 6a is Clarence Center's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Clarence Center's 214-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Clarence Center
Each reading below is measured for Clarence Center itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredClarence Center runs about 214 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
MeasuredClarence Center sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Clarence Center is in
Clarence Center sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Clarence Center's own centroid rather than borrowed from Erie County.
What Grows in Clarence Center
Every plant below cleared Clarence Center's own zone 6a and its 214-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Clarence Center?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (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 Clarence Center
Spotted lanternfly documented 13 miles from Clarence Center, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Clarence Center
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Clarence Center. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CLARENCE CENTER ELEM SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- POW-R DEVICESBrownfields · 1700 ft
- YELLOW GOOSE MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- KENYONSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- TOWN OF CLARENCE HWY.DEPT.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- TOWN OF CLARENCE WATER DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- CLARENCE CTRL SCHOOL TRANSPORT. DEPT.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- NOCO MOTOR FUELS S-6Underground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- LEDGEVIEW ELEMUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- MARK A. & SHERRILL A. MAIERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- RESIDENCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- MITSCHER RESIDENCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Clarence Center'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 Clarence Center.
Total Sites
1,129
within ~10 miles of Clarence Center
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
7 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Clarence Center
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Clarence Center
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
Check your specific parcel in Clarence Center
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 Clarence Center average
Your land is one point inside Clarence Center
Everything above resolves to Clarence Center 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 Clarence Center Average
Clarence Center Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Clarence Center
- ●One soil character for all of Clarence Center
- ●Frost dates read at Clarence Center's scale: Apr 10 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Clarence Center's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Clarence Center
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Clarence Center, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Clarence Center averages can't show:
We read public map data around Clarence Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Clarence Center average
How we know this about Clarence Center
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 Clarence Center’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 Clarence Center
When does frost risk typically end in Clarence Center?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Clarence Center typically lands around Apr 10, 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 May 1.
When is the first frost in Clarence Center?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Clarence Center 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 214 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Clarence Center?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Clarence Center sees about 214 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 27, about 179 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Clarence Center?
The federal record around Clarence Center is a meaningful one — 1,129 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (585), 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 Clarence Center?
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 Clarence Center's scale — its 6a band and its 214-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Clarence Center'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 Clarence Center’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Clarence Center's own scale — its own ~214-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,445 acres it covers and 1,129 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Clarence Center's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Clarence Center's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Nov 10 and the ~214-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,129 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Clarence Center, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Clarence Center's boundary and the 1,445 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~214-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Clarence Center's own centroid, the Eastern Great Lakes LowlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Clarence Centerlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Clarence Center's 1,445 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Erie County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Erie County
- The growing challenges every New York grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New York
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Erie County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Clarence Center's 1,445 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Clarence Center you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,445 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 Clarence Center-wide figureread your own land →
More in New York
Wider growing context
What grows across New YorkClarence Center sits outside our named growing regions, so New York as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides