Dresden, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — 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, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Dresden, 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 Dresden 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 Dresden — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Dresden — the short answer
Dresden, New York: USDA zone 6b, about 215 days between hard freezes, across 193 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~215
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 193 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 6b is Dresden's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Dresden's 215-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Dresden
Each reading below is measured for Dresden itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredDresden runs about 215 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
MeasuredDresden sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Dresden is in
Dresden sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Dresden's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Yates County is mostly Northern Allegheny Plateau. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Dresden
Every plant below cleared Dresden's own zone 6b and its 215-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Dresden?
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 Mar 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Dresden
Spotted lanternfly documented 8 miles from Dresden, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Dresden
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Dresden. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- NAVAL UNDERSEA WARFARE CTR DIV, NEWPORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- TOWN OF TORREYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- SENECA LAKE SONAR TEST FACILITYBrownfields · 1300 ft
- ABTEX CORPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- GREENIDGE GENERATION LLCToxics Release Inventory · 0.5 mi
- GREENIDGE GENERATION LLCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- FERRO CORP, TRANSELCO DIVISIONBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- FERRO CORP, TRANSELCO DIVISIONToxics Release Inventory · 0.9 mi
- MERCURY AIRCRAFT INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- CITY HILL CONSTRUCTION INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- FRIENDS OF THE OUTLETBrownfields · 2.0 mi
- OUTLET TIRE SALES INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Dresden'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 Dresden.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Dresden
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Dresden
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Dresden, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Dresden — CAFO (13 sites) and Superfund (3 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Dresden
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 Dresden average
Your land is one point inside Dresden
Everything above resolves to Dresden as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 193 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 Dresden Average
Dresden Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Dresden
- ●One soil character for all of Dresden
- ●Frost dates read at Dresden's scale: Apr 8 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Dresden's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Dresden
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Dresden, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Dresden averages can't show:
We read public map data around Dresden — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Dresden average
How we know this about Dresden
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 Dresden’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 Dresden
When does frost risk typically end in Dresden?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Dresden typically lands around Apr 8, 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 29.
When is the first frost in Dresden?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Dresden typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 215 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Dresden?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Dresden sees about 215 frost-free days — roughly Apr 8 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 29 to Oct 26, about 180 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Dresden?
The federal record around Dresden is a meaningful one — 208 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (108), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Dresden?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Dresden's scale — its 6b band and its 215-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Dresden'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 Dresden’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Dresden's own scale — its own ~215-day season between 28°F freezes, the 193 acres it covers and 208 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Dresden's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Dresden's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 8 and Nov 9 and the ~215-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 208 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Dresden, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Dresden's boundary and the 193 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~215-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Dresden sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Dresdenlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Dresden's 193 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Yates County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Yates 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 Yates County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Dresden's 193 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Dresden you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 193 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Dresden-wide figureread your own land →
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