Covedale, Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Covedale, 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 Covedale 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 Covedale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Covedale — the short answer
Covedale, Ohio: USDA zone 6b, about 222 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- 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
- ~222
- 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 6b is Covedale's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Covedale's 222-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Covedale
Each reading below is measured for Covedale itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCovedale runs about 222 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
MeasuredCovedale 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 Covedale is in
Covedale sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Covedale's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Hamilton County is mostly Eastern Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Covedale
Every plant below cleared Covedale's own zone 6b and its 222-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Covedale?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (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 Covedale
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Covedale, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Covedale
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Covedale. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KRUEGER-MADDUX GREENHOUSESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- CINCINNATI BELL TELEPHONE CO.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRIES, INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 0.8 mi
- GREEN TOWNSHIP FIRE DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- UNITED DAIRY FARMERS #091Underground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- DELHI TOWNSHIP TRUSTEESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- DELHI TOWNSHIPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- UNITED DAIRY FARMERS #146Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- EMRO SPEEDWAY NO 5409 *Brownfields · 1.0 mi
- FASHION CLEANERSBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- SPEEDWAY #5409Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- MALO, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Covedale'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 Covedale.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Covedale
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Covedale
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Covedale, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Covedale — Superfund (37 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (156 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Covedale
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 Covedale average
Your land is one point inside Covedale
Everything above resolves to Covedale 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 Covedale Average
Covedale Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Covedale
- ●One soil character for all of Covedale
- ●Frost dates read at Covedale's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Covedale's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Covedale
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Covedale, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Covedale averages can't show:
We read public map data around Covedale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Covedale average
How we know this about Covedale
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 Covedale’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 Covedale
When does frost risk typically end in Covedale?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Covedale typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Covedale?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Covedale 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 222 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Covedale?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Covedale sees about 222 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 28, about 187 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Covedale?
The federal record around Covedale is a meaningful one — 2,112 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,291), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Covedale?
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 Covedale's scale — its 6b band and its 222-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Covedale'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 Covedale’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Covedale's own scale — its own ~222-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,810 acres it covers and 2,112 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Covedale's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Covedale's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 11 and the ~222-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,112 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Covedale, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Covedale's boundary and the 1,810 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~222-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Covedale sits in the Interior Plateau — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Covedalelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Covedale's 1,810 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hamilton County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hamilton County
- The growing challenges every Ohio grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Ohio
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Hamilton County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Covedale's 1,810 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Covedale you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,810 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Covedale-wide figureread your own land →
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