Annville, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Annville, 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 Annville 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 Annville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Annville — the short answer
Annville, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 1
- 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
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 7a is Annville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Annville's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Annville
Each reading below is measured for Annville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredAnnville runs about 219 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
MeasuredAnnville sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Annville is in
Annville sits in the Ridge and Valley — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Annville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Lebanon County.
What Grows in Annville
Every plant below cleared Annville's own zone 7a and its 219-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Annville?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 4; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 1 (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. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Annville
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Annville, first recorded 2017. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Annville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Annville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- THE LEBANON VALLEY HOMEBrownfields · 750 ft
- JAKES AUTO EXCHANGEBrownfields · 1100 ft
- BOGER CONCRETE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- LEBANON VALLEY COLLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- ANNVILLE UNITED METH CHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- SPEEDWAY 6765Brownfields · 1900 ft
- SPEEDWAY 6765Underground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- AMER LEGION HOME ASSOCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- AUTO SVCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- TURKEY HILL 45Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- SAL RUSSO ROMA PIZZAUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- LB 1159Nitrate · 2400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Annville'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 Annville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Annville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Annville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Annville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Annville — CAFO (55 sites) and Nitrate (310 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Annville
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 Annville average
Your land is one point inside Annville
Everything above resolves to Annville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Annville Average
Annville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Annville
- ●One soil character for all of Annville
- ●Frost dates read at Annville's scale: Apr 1 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Annville's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Annville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Annville, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Annville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Annville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Annville average
How we know this about Annville
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 Annville’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 Annville
When does frost risk typically end in Annville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Annville typically lands around Apr 1, 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 22.
When is the first frost in Annville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Annville 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 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Annville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Annville sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Apr 1 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 22 to Oct 23, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Annville?
The federal record around Annville is a meaningful one — 1,061 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (459), the nearest Brownfields 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 Annville?
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 Annville's scale — its 7a band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Annville'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 Annville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Annville's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,038 acres it covers and 1,061 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Annville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Annville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 1 and Nov 6 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,061 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Annville, the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Annville's boundary and the 1,038 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Annville's own centroid, the Ridge and ValleyUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Annvillelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Annville's 1,038 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lebanon County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lebanon County
- The growing challenges every Pennsylvania grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Pennsylvania
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Lebanon County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Annville's 1,038 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Annville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,038 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Annville-wide figureread your own land →
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