Gates, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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 Gates, 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 Gates 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 Gates — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Gates — the short answer
Gates, New York: USDA zone 6b, about 209 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~209
- 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 6b is Gates's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Gates's 209-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Gates
Each reading below is measured for Gates itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGates runs about 209 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
MeasuredGates 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 Gates is in
Gates sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Gates's own centroid rather than borrowed from Monroe County.
What Grows in Gates
Every plant below cleared Gates's own zone 6b and its 209-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Gates?
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 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 12 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 7 — 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 Gates
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Gates, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Gates
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Gates. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MOBIL S/S 08-FTD/11714Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- HOPE HALLUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- HESS CORPORATIONBrownfields · 2400 ft
- TOWN OF GATESUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- TOWN OF GATES POLICE DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- DAN MCDONALD AUTOMOTIVE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- SPEEDWAY # 7665Underground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- NYSDOT BIN 1052280Brownfields · 0.5 mi
- MOBIL R/S 10179Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- DAVE GREEN AUTOMOTIVE OF GATES INCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- GATES CLEANERSBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- OLINDO'S FOOD SERVICE PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Gates'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 Gates.
Total Sites
2,262
within ~10 miles of Gates
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
17 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Gates
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Gates
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 Gates
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 Gates average
Your land is one point inside Gates
Everything above resolves to Gates 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 Gates Average
Gates Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Gates
- ●One soil character for all of Gates
- ●Frost dates read at Gates's scale: Apr 12 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Gates's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Gates
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Gates, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Gates averages can't show:
We read public map data around Gates — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Gates average
How we know this about Gates
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 Gates’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 Gates
When does frost risk typically end in Gates?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Gates typically lands around Apr 12, 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 3.
When is the first frost in Gates?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Gates typically arrives around Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 24, so the watching starts about Oct 8 — about 209 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Gates?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Gates sees about 209 frost-free days — roughly Apr 12 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 3 to Oct 24, about 174 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Gates?
The federal record around Gates is a meaningful one — 2,262 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,199), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Gates?
From about Oct 8 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 7 (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 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Gates's scale — its 6b band and its 209-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Gates'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 Gates’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Gates's own scale — its own ~209-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,267 acres it covers and 2,262 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Gates's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Gates's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 12 and Nov 7 and the ~209-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,262 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Gates, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Gates's boundary and the 1,267 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~209-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Gates's own centroid, the Eastern Great Lakes LowlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Gateslydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Gates's 1,267 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Monroe County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Monroe 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 Monroe County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Gates's 1,267 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Gates you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,267 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Gates-wide figureread your own land →