Tonawanda Town, 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 Tonawanda Town, 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 Tonawanda Town 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 Tonawanda Town — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Tonawanda Town — the short answer
Tonawanda Town, New York: USDA zone 6b, about 212 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~212
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 11K 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 Tonawanda Town's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Tonawanda Town's 212-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Tonawanda Town
Each reading below is measured for Tonawanda Town itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredTonawanda Town runs about 212 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
MeasuredTonawanda Town 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 Tonawanda Town is in
Tonawanda Town sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Tonawanda Town's own centroid rather than borrowed from Erie County.
What Grows in Tonawanda Town
Every plant below cleared Tonawanda Town's own zone 6b and its 212-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Tonawanda Town?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 16; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — 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 Tonawanda Town
Spotted lanternfly documented 8 miles from Tonawanda Town, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Tonawanda Town
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Tonawanda Town. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PHILLIP SHERIDAN BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- MOUNT SAINT MARY ACADEMYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- SHERIDAN DELAWARE PLAZAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- NORSTAR BANK N AUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- D & W SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- SUNOCO #0363-3567Underground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- ST ANDREWS CHURCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- TOPS MARKET #239Underground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- B & B WHOLESALEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- SHETLAND PRODUCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- SHERIDAN MANOR APARTMENTSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- CVS PHARMACY #0598Brownfields · 2100 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Tonawanda Town'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 Tonawanda Town.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Tonawanda Town
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Tonawanda Town
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Tonawanda Town, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Tonawanda Town — Superfund (70 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (214 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Tonawanda Town
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 Tonawanda Town average
Your land is one point inside Tonawanda Town
Everything above resolves to Tonawanda Town as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 11K 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 Tonawanda Town Average
Tonawanda Town Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Tonawanda Town
- ●One soil character for all of Tonawanda Town
- ●Frost dates read at Tonawanda Town's scale: Apr 13 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Tonawanda Town's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Tonawanda Town
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Tonawanda Town, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Tonawanda Town averages can't show:
We read public map data around Tonawanda Town — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Tonawanda Town average
How we know this about Tonawanda Town
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 Tonawanda Town’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 Tonawanda Town
When does frost risk typically end in Tonawanda Town?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Tonawanda Town typically lands around Apr 13, 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 4.
When is the first frost in Tonawanda Town?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Tonawanda Town typically arrives around Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 28, so the watching starts about Oct 12 — about 212 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Tonawanda Town?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Tonawanda Town sees about 212 frost-free days — roughly Apr 13 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 4 to Oct 28, about 177 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Tonawanda Town?
The federal record around Tonawanda Town runs heavier than most — 2,974 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,439), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Tonawanda Town?
From about Oct 12 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 11 (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 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Tonawanda Town's scale — its 6b band and its 212-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Tonawanda Town'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 Tonawanda Town’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Tonawanda Town's own scale — its own ~212-day season between 28°F freezes, the 11,071 acres it covers and 2,974 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Tonawanda Town's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Tonawanda Town's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 13 and Nov 11 and the ~212-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,974 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Tonawanda Town, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Tonawanda Town's boundary and the 11,071 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~212-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Tonawanda Town's own centroid, the Eastern Great Lakes LowlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Tonawanda Townlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Tonawanda Town's 11,071 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 Tonawanda Town's 11,071 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Tonawanda Town you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 11,071 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 Tonawanda Town-wide figureread your own land →
More in New York
Wider growing context
What grows across New YorkTonawanda Town sits outside our named growing regions, so New York as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides