Damascus, Oregon, sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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 Damascus, 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 Damascus 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 Damascus — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Damascus — the short answer
Damascus, Oregon: USDA zone 8b, about 242 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 8b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 25
- Clackamas County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 22
- Clackamas County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Days between freezes
- ~242
- Clackamas County normal — NOAA 1991–2020, nearest to this town
- Town area
- 11K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. No 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid, so the hard-freeze dates are Clackamas County’s — the closest measured record, labelled as such rather than passed off as local.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 8b is Damascus's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Damascus's 242-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Damascus
Each reading below is measured for Damascus itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
From county recordsDamascus runs about 242 days between hard freezes (read from Clackamas County, the closest normal to Damascus) — 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
MeasuredDamascus sits in USDA hardiness zone 8b.
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 Damascus is in
Damascus sits in the Willamette Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Marine West Coast Forest. That is read at Damascus's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Clackamas County is mostly Cascades. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Damascus
Every plant below cleared Damascus's own zone 8b and its 242-day season. Each card opens that plant's Oregon profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Damascus?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 25; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 22 — 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 Damascus
Survey cells within 31 miles of Damascus checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 531 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Damascus
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Damascus. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- DAMASCUS 76Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- SAFEWAY STORE 521Brownfields · 0.8 mi
- SAFEWAY GASOLINE #0521Underground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- SEGRIN, DANEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- DAMASCUS WATER DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- VIP AUTOMOTIVE SERVICESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- DESIGN CRAFT DOOR INCBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- INSULATION REMOVAL CORPBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- KUMHO USA, INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- WESCOTTS AUTO RESTYLINGToxics Release Inventory · 1.0 mi
- WESCOTTS AUTO RESTYLINGBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- LKQ FOSTER AUTO PARTS INCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Damascus'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 Damascus.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Damascus
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Damascus
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Damascus, Superfund runs higher than the national average — 28 sites within ~10 miles of Damascus. 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.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Damascus
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 Damascus average
Your land is one point inside Damascus
Everything above resolves to Damascus as a whole — one PHZM band, read across 11K acres, with hard-freeze dates borrowed from Clackamas County’s record because no 30-year normal resolves at this town’s own centroid. 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 Damascus Average
Damascus Average
- ●USDA Zones 8b, averaged across Damascus
- ●One soil character for all of Damascus
- ●Frost dates read at Damascus's scale: Mar 25 to Nov 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Damascus's 8b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Damascus
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Damascus, Oregon — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Damascus averages can't show:
We read public map data around Damascus — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Damascus average
How we know this about Damascus
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 Clackamas County’s record, because none resolves here; 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 Damascus
When does frost risk typically end in Damascus?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Damascus typically lands around Mar 25, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Damascus?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Damascus typically arrives around Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 8, so the watching starts about Oct 23 — about 242 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Damascus?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Damascus sees about 242 frost-free days — roughly Mar 25 through Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 15 to Nov 8, about 207 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Damascus?
The federal record around Damascus is a meaningful one — 1,736 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (936), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Damascus?
From about Oct 23 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 22 (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 22. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Damascus's scale — its 8b band and its 242-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Damascus'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 Damascus’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Damascus's own scale — the 11,113 acres it covers and 1,736 documented sites around it; 5 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Damascus's own USDA hardiness band, zones 8bUSDA PHZM 2023
- 1,736 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Damascus, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Damascus's boundary and the 11,113 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 8b and a ~242-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Damascus sits in the Willamette Valley — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Damascus checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- The 28°F hard-freeze dates — Damascus has no normal of its own, so its county's is the closest measured readfrom Clackamas County
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Damascus's 11,113 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Clackamas County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Clackamas County
- The growing challenges every Oregon grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Oregon
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Clackamas County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Damascus's 11,113 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Damascus you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 11,113 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Damascus-wide figureread your own land →