Forest County, in Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, blackberry, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Forest County lies within Appalachia — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Forest County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Forest County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Forest County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Forest County — the short answer
Forest County, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 6a, about 168 days between hard freezes, across 273K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- May 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~168
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 273K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 6a is Forest County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Forest County's 168-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Forest County
Across a year, Forest County accumulates about 2,038 growing degree days above 50°F, about 509 fewer than the middle Pennsylvania county — ahead of 8 of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Forest County
Across Forest County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Cookport, Hazleton, and Buchanan are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 4.1–4.6, extremely acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
15%
Hydric soils
4%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Forest County
The USDA soil survey maps 49% of Forest County as moderately well drained — but another 49% drains differently: 40% well drained, 6% somewhat poorly drained.
Cookport is the most extensive named soil at 32% of mapped acres, then Hazleton (28%) and Buchanan (13%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Forest County
Each reading below is measured for Forest County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Forest County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group C/D — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Forest County runs about pH 4.1–4.6, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredForest County runs about 168 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredForest County sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Forest County is in
Forest County sits in the North Central Appalachians — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northern Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Forest County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Forest County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 168-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile.
Is it too late to plant in Forest County?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Apr 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near May 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 19 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Forest County
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Forest County, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
- monarch butterfly2 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Forest County
USGS estimates 800 lb of Glyphosate on Forest County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (768 lb) and Metolachlor-s (565 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Forest County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Forest County — 51 documented sites across 4 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 6 brownfield sites. Former commercial or industrial land where legacy contamination may persist.
The federal record across Forest County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Forest County
Closest first, across Forest County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WHIG HILL STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.8 mi
- AQUA PA JENKS TWP WTPPFAS · 5.9 mi
- FOOLS CREEK STOREUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.1 mi
- EAST FOREST SCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.0 mi
- MARIENVILLE GULFUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.1 mi
- GATEWAY FORDUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.1 mi
- PA GAME COMMUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.1 mi
- ANCHOR GLASS CONTAINERBrownfields · 7.1 mi
- ABRAXAS FOUNDATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.2 mi
- MARIENVILLE QUICK STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.2 mi
- HARDWARE DESIGNERS INCBrownfields · 7.3 mi
- NATL FOREST PRODBrownfields · 7.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Forest County'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 Forest County.
Sources Checked
across Forest County
Severity Distribution
across Forest County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Forest County, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 38 sites across Forest County. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Forest County
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 Forest County average
Your land is one point inside Forest County
Everything above resolves to Forest County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 273K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Forest County Average
Forest County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Forest County
- ●One soil character for all of Forest County
- ●Frost dates read at Forest County's scale: May 4 to Oct 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Forest County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Forest County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Forest County, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Forest County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Forest County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Forest County average
How we know this about Forest County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Forest County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Forest County
When does frost risk typically end in Forest County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Forest County typically lands around May 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 May 25.
How long is the growing season in Forest County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Forest County sees about 168 frost-free days — roughly May 4 through Oct 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 25 to Oct 5, about 133 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Forest County?
The federal record around Forest County shows 51 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (38), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.8 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Forest County's scale — its 6a band and its 168-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Forest County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Pennsylvania's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Forest County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Forest County's own scale — its own ~168-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 51 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Forest County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Forest County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~168-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Forest CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 51 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 3.8 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Forest County's boundary and the 273,445 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~168-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Forest County sitting wholly inside the North Central AppalachiansUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Forest County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Forest County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Pennsylvania grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Pennsylvania
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Forest County — the ~168 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Forest County's 273,445 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 51 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Forest Countyread your own land →