East Durham, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in East Durham, 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 East Durham 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 East Durham — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
East Durham — the short answer
East Durham, New York: USDA zone 5b, about 187 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~187
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 5b is East Durham's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against East Durham's 187-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in East Durham
Each reading below is measured for East Durham itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredEast Durham runs about 187 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredEast Durham sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 East Durham is in
East Durham sits in the Northern Allegheny Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at East Durham's own centroid rather than borrowed from Greene County.
What Grows in East Durham
Every plant below cleared East Durham's own zone 5b and its 187-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in East Durham?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 21; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 18 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 22 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
Documented around East Durham
Spotted lanternfly documented 13 miles from East Durham, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near East Durham
Closest first, within ~10 miles of East Durham. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MIRACLE MOUNTAIN RESORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- STORY'S NURSERY INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- GREENE COUNTY HIGHWAY DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- GSK OAK HILLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- GLAXOSMITHKLINE LLCToxics Release Inventory · 2.0 mi
- GLAXOSMITHKLINE LLCBrownfields · 2.0 mi
- GETTY #58769Underground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- CAIRO DURHAM MIDDLE/HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- OLD FARM LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- BIRCH HILL ENTERPRISES, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- THE MILK RUNUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.9 mi
- NYSDOT BIN 1073210Brownfields · 3.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from East Durham'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 East Durham.
Total Sites
156
within ~10 miles of East Durham
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of East Durham
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of East Durham
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around East Durham, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 58 sites within ~10 miles of East Durham. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in East Durham
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 East Durham average
Your land is one point inside East Durham
Everything above resolves to East Durham as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 East Durham Average
East Durham Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across East Durham
- ●One soil character for all of East Durham
- ●Frost dates read at East Durham's scale: Apr 18 to Oct 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not East Durham's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in East Durham
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in East Durham, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that East Durham averages can't show:
We read public map data around East Durham — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the East Durham average
How we know this about East Durham
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 East Durham’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 East Durham
When does frost risk typically end in East Durham?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in East Durham typically lands around Apr 18, 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 9.
When is the first frost in East Durham?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in East Durham typically arrives around Oct 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 8, so the watching starts about Sep 22 — about 187 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in East Durham?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, East Durham sees about 187 frost-free days — roughly Apr 18 through Oct 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 9 to Oct 8, about 152 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in East Durham?
The federal record around East Durham shows 156 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (77), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.9 miles 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 East Durham?
From about Sep 22 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 Oct 22 (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 Oct 22. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at East Durham's scale — its 5b band and its 187-day season. Your yard writes its own version of East Durham'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 East Durham’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at East Durham's own scale — its own ~187-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,204 acres it covers and 156 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- East Durham's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- East Durham's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 18 and Oct 22 and the ~187-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 156 documented contamination sites on the federal record near East Durham, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.9 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- East Durham's boundary and the 2,204 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~187-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at East Durham's own centroid, the Northern Allegheny PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of East Durhamlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so East Durham's 2,204 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Greene County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Greene 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 Greene County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among East Durham's 2,204 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of East Durham you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,204 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.9 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 East Durham-wide figureread your own land →