Granite Quarry, North Carolina, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Granite Quarry, 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 Granite Quarry 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 Granite Quarry — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Granite Quarry — the short answer
Granite Quarry, North Carolina: USDA zone 7b, about 235 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 20
- 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
- ~235
- 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 7b is Granite Quarry's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Granite Quarry's 235-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Granite Quarry
Each reading below is measured for Granite Quarry itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGranite Quarry runs about 235 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
MeasuredGranite Quarry sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Granite Quarry is in
Granite Quarry sits in the Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Granite Quarry's own centroid rather than borrowed from Rowan County.
What Grows in Granite Quarry
Every plant below cleared Granite Quarry's own zone 7b and its 235-day season. Each card opens that plant's North Carolina profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Granite Quarry?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 20 (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 Granite Quarry
Spotted lanternfly documented 23 miles from Granite Quarry, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Granite Quarry
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Granite Quarry. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BROWN SUPPLY CO.Underground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- GRANITE QUARRY CLEANERSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- W.F. BRINKLEY & SON CONST CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- EASTSIDE KWIK STOP, INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- MASON'S MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- W.F. BRINKLEY & SON CONSTRUCTIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- JIM'S TIRES & ALIGNMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- CIRCLE K 2701491Underground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- GAS AND GO - L614Underground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- EAST ROWAN SHELLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- TYME SAVER FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- PANTRY 592Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Granite Quarry'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 Granite Quarry.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Granite Quarry
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Granite Quarry
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Granite Quarry, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Granite Quarry — Toxics Release Inventory (61 sites) and Superfund (9 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Granite Quarry
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 Granite Quarry average
Your land is one point inside Granite Quarry
Everything above resolves to Granite Quarry 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 Granite Quarry Average
Granite Quarry Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Granite Quarry
- ●One soil character for all of Granite Quarry
- ●Frost dates read at Granite Quarry's scale: Mar 20 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Granite Quarry's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Granite Quarry
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Granite Quarry, North Carolina — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Granite Quarry averages can't show:
We read public map data around Granite Quarry — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Granite Quarry average
How we know this about Granite Quarry
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 Granite Quarry’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 Granite Quarry
When does frost risk typically end in Granite Quarry?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Granite Quarry typically lands around Mar 20, 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 10.
When is the first frost in Granite Quarry?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Granite Quarry 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 235 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Granite Quarry?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Granite Quarry sees about 235 frost-free days — roughly Mar 20 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 10 to Oct 27, about 200 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Granite Quarry?
The federal record around Granite Quarry is a meaningful one — 588 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (380), 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 Granite Quarry?
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 Granite Quarry's scale — its 7b band and its 235-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Granite Quarry'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 Granite Quarry’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Granite Quarry's own scale — its own ~235-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,885 acres it covers and 588 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Granite Quarry's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Granite Quarry's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 20 and Nov 10 and the ~235-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 588 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Granite Quarry, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Granite Quarry's boundary and the 1,885 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~235-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Granite Quarry's own centroid, the PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Granite Quarrylydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Granite Quarry's 1,885 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Rowan County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Rowan County
- The growing challenges every North Carolina grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom North Carolina
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Rowan County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Granite Quarry's 1,885 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Granite Quarry you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,885 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 Granite Quarry-wide figureread your own land →
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