Lackawanna County, in Pennsylvania, 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.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Lackawanna 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
Lackawanna County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lackawanna County — the short answer
Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 6b, about 199 days between hard freezes, across 294K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~199
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 294K 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 6b is Lackawanna County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lackawanna County's 199-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Lackawanna County
Across a year, Lackawanna County accumulates about 2,447 growing degree days above 50°F, about 100 fewer than the middle Pennsylvania county — ahead of 28 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 Lackawanna County
Across Lackawanna County, the ground is predominantly Inceptisols, where Morris, Oquaga, and Wellsboro are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a channery loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.3–5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group D soils.
Soil order
Inceptisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
5%
Hydric soils
10%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lackawanna County
The USDA soil survey maps 33% of Lackawanna County as well drained — but another 54% drains differently: 19% somewhat poorly drained, 16% moderately well drained.
Morris is the most extensive named soil at 14% of mapped acres, then Oquaga (12%) and Wellsboro (11%).
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 Lackawanna County
Each reading below is measured for Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County are well drained, in hydrologic group D — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Lackawanna County runs about pH 5.3–5.5, 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
MeasuredLackawanna County runs about 199 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
MeasuredLackawanna County 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 Lackawanna County is in
Lackawanna County spans 3 EPA Level III ecoregions — Ridge and Valley (44%), Northern Allegheny Plateau (40%) and North Central Appalachians (16%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Lackawanna County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lackawanna County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 199-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 Lackawanna County?
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 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 27 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around Lackawanna County
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Lackawanna County, first recorded 2018. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle9 documented records
- monarch butterfly7 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Lackawanna County
USGS estimates 2,990 lb of Glyphosate on Lackawanna County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (373 lb) and Atrazine (363 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 Lackawanna County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lackawanna County — 986 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 9 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Lackawanna County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Lackawanna County
Closest first, across Lackawanna County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MAID RITE STEAK CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- KEYSTONE MEDICAL LABORATORIES/ PATHOLOGY ASSOCBrownfields · 650 ft
- TRANE COMPToxics Release Inventory · 750 ft
- REUBEN H DONNELLEYBrownfields · 800 ft
- THOMSON 1 & THOMSON 2Underground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- HARPERCOLLINS PUBUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- TROOP RUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- AIRLINE PETRO REEVES STREET GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- RYDER TRUCK RENTAL 0609Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- I-84 OVER LACKAWANNA RR ROARING BROOK & SR 435 ECMS 69181Brownfields · 2400 ft
- ASSAI ENERGY, LLCBrownfields · 2500 ft
- SEABOARD TANK LINESUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County.
Sources Checked
across Lackawanna County
Severity Distribution
across Lackawanna County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County average
Your land is one point inside Lackawanna County
Everything above resolves to Lackawanna County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 294K 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 Lackawanna County Average
Lackawanna County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Lackawanna County
- ●One soil character for all of Lackawanna County
- ●Frost dates read at Lackawanna County's scale: Apr 11 to Oct 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lackawanna County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lackawanna County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lackawanna County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lackawanna County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lackawanna County average
How we know this about Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lackawanna County
When does frost risk typically end in Lackawanna County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lackawanna County typically lands around Apr 11, 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 2.
How long is the growing season in Lackawanna County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lackawanna County sees about 199 frost-free days — roughly Apr 11 through Oct 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 2 to Oct 13, about 164 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lackawanna County?
The federal record around Lackawanna County runs heavier than most — 986 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (556), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
Everything above is measured at Lackawanna County's scale — its 6b band and its 199-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Lackawanna County's own scale — its own ~199-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 986 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lackawanna County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lackawanna County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~199-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Lackawanna CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 986 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Lackawanna County's boundary and the 293,688 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~199-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 3 ecoregions Lackawanna County spans, Ridge and Valley the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Lackawanna County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lackawanna 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 Lackawanna County — the ~199 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 Lackawanna County's 293,688 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 986 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 Lackawanna Countyread your own land →