Springdale, North Carolina, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, fig, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Springdale, 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 Springdale 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 Springdale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Springdale — the short answer
Springdale, North Carolina: USDA zone 8a, about 255 days between hard freezes, across 454 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~255
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 454 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 8a is Springdale's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Springdale's 255-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Springdale
Each reading below is measured for Springdale itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSpringdale runs about 255 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
MeasuredSpringdale sits in USDA hardiness zone 8a.
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 Springdale is in
Springdale sits in the Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Springdale's own centroid rather than borrowed from Gaston County.
What Grows in Springdale
Every plant below cleared Springdale's own zone 8a and its 255-day season. Each card opens that plant's North Carolina profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Springdale?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 13 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 23 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Springdale
Spotted lanternfly documented 23 miles from Springdale, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Springdale
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Springdale. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FLEETWOOD DRIVE DRUM SITESuperfund · 900 ft
- T.A. GREEN GROCERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- MILLEN'S SER STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- PINE GROVE AMOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SPEEDWAY 60Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SAV-A-TON 91Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- FASTOP 305Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- KVPS NC REALTY LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- KINGSWAY 6Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- MODERN GLOBE, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- SPRING FORD KNITTING COToxics Release Inventory · 0.8 mi
- TI-CARO REX DIVISION 2Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Springdale'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 Springdale.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Springdale
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Springdale
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Springdale, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Springdale — Superfund (18 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (77 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Springdale
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 Springdale average
Your land is one point inside Springdale
Everything above resolves to Springdale as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 454 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 Springdale Average
Springdale Average
- ●USDA Zones 8a, averaged across Springdale
- ●One soil character for all of Springdale
- ●Frost dates read at Springdale's scale: Mar 13 to Nov 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Springdale's 8a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Springdale
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Springdale, North Carolina — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Springdale averages can't show:
We read public map data around Springdale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Springdale average
How we know this about Springdale
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 Springdale’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 Springdale
When does frost risk typically end in Springdale?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Springdale typically lands around Mar 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 Apr 3.
When is the first frost in Springdale?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Springdale typically arrives around Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 9, so the watching starts about Oct 24 — about 255 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Springdale?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Springdale sees about 255 frost-free days — roughly Mar 13 through Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 3 to Nov 9, about 220 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Springdale?
The federal record around Springdale runs heavier than most — 951 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (612), the nearest Superfund 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 Springdale?
From about Oct 24 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 23 (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 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Springdale's scale — its 8a band and its 255-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Springdale'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 Springdale’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Springdale's own scale — its own ~255-day season between 28°F freezes, the 454 acres it covers and 951 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Springdale's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Springdale's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 13 and Nov 23 and the ~255-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 951 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Springdale, the closest Superfund record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Springdale's boundary and the 454 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8a and a ~255-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Springdale's own centroid, the PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Springdalelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Springdale's 454 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Gaston County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Gaston 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 Gaston County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Springdale's 454 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Springdale you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 454 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund 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 Springdale-wide figureread your own land →
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