Sinking Spring, Ohio, 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 Sinking Spring, 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 Sinking Spring 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 Sinking Spring — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Sinking Spring — the short answer
Sinking Spring, Ohio: USDA zone 6b, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 299 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 299 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 Sinking Spring's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Sinking Spring's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Sinking Spring
Each reading below is measured for Sinking Spring itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSinking Spring runs about 216 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
MeasuredSinking Spring 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 Sinking Spring is in
Sinking Spring sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Sinking Spring's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Highland County is mostly Eastern Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Sinking Spring
Every plant below cleared Sinking Spring's own zone 6b and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Sinking Spring?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Sinking Spring
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Sinking Spring. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FAMILY DOLLAR #10455Brownfields · 400 ft
- 1st STOP SINKING SPRING #58Underground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- FORMERLY VALLEY MARKET LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- COUNTY LINE CARRYOUTUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- ODNR PIKE STATE FORESTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- LATHAM LUMBERUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- LOUDEN GENERAL STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.8 mi
- LOCUST GROVE GENERAL STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.3 mi
- CRUM FARM SUPPLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- RAY'S TOWINGBrownfields · 5.9 mi
- REEDS SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.9 mi
- JONES MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Sinking Spring'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 Sinking Spring.
Total Sites
50
within ~10 miles of Sinking Spring
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Sinking Spring
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Sinking Spring, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 37 sites within ~10 miles of Sinking Spring. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Sinking Spring
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 Sinking Spring average
Your land is one point inside Sinking Spring
Everything above resolves to Sinking Spring as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 299 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 Sinking Spring Average
Sinking Spring Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Sinking Spring
- ●One soil character for all of Sinking Spring
- ●Frost dates read at Sinking Spring's scale: Apr 4 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Sinking Spring's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Sinking Spring
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Sinking Spring, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Sinking Spring averages can't show:
We read public map data around Sinking Spring — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Sinking Spring average
How we know this about Sinking Spring
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 Sinking Spring’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 Sinking Spring
When does frost risk typically end in Sinking Spring?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Sinking Spring typically lands around Apr 4, 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 25.
When is the first frost in Sinking Spring?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Sinking Spring typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Sinking Spring?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Sinking Spring sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Apr 4 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 25 to Oct 23, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Sinking Spring?
The federal record around Sinking Spring is a meaningful one — 50 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (37), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile 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 Sinking Spring?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Sinking Spring's scale — its 6b band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Sinking Spring'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 Sinking Spring’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Sinking Spring's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 299 acres it covers and 50 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Sinking Spring's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Sinking Spring's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 4 and Nov 6 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 50 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Sinking Spring, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Sinking Spring's boundary and the 299 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Sinking Spring sits in the Interior Plateau — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Sinking Spring's 299 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Highland County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Highland 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 Highland County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Sinking Spring's 299 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Sinking Spring you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 299 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile 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 Sinking Spring-wide figureread your own land →
More in Ohio
Wider growing context
What grows across OhioSinking Spring sits outside our named growing regions, so Ohio as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides