Luzerne County, in Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Luzerne 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
Luzerne County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Luzerne 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 Luzerne County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Luzerne County — the short answer
Luzerne County, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 6b, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 569K 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 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 569K 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 Luzerne County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Luzerne County's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Luzerne County
Across a year, Luzerne County accumulates about 2,441 growing degree days above 50°F, about 106 fewer than the middle Pennsylvania county — ahead of 27 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 Luzerne County
Across Luzerne County, the ground is predominantly Inceptisols, where Oquaga, Wellsboro, and Lordstown are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a channery silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.3–5.5, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Inceptisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
14%
Hydric soils
5%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Luzerne County
The USDA soil survey maps 49% of Luzerne County as well drained — but another 43% drains differently: 22% moderately well drained, 8% somewhat excessively drained.
Oquaga is the most extensive named soil at 17% of mapped acres, then Wellsboro (14%) and Lordstown (10%).
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 Luzerne County
Each reading below is measured for Luzerne 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 Luzerne County are well drained, in hydrologic group C — 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 Luzerne 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
MeasuredLuzerne County runs about 200 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
MeasuredLuzerne 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 Luzerne County is in
Luzerne County spans 3 EPA Level III ecoregions — Ridge and Valley (61%), Northern Allegheny Plateau (21%) and North Central Appalachians (18%). 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 Luzerne County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Luzerne County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 200-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 Luzerne County?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 28 — 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 Luzerne County
Spotted lanternfly documented 1 miles from Luzerne County, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle2 documented records
- monarch butterfly85 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Luzerne County
USGS estimates 17,721 lb of Glyphosate on Luzerne County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (13,729 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (10,018 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 Luzerne County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Luzerne County — 1,633 documented sites across 8 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 12 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Luzerne 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 Luzerne County
Closest first, across Luzerne County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MICKEY KMETZ GARAGE & SVC STAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- NUANGOLA SVC STAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- COCOA HUT 103Underground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- PA DOT CONST PROJ SR3046 FORMER LARMEL INNUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- ADVANCED TECH CTR BLDG 12Underground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- NANTICOKE CR OBSERVATION WELL AT WARRIOR RUN, PANitrate · 1.5 mi
- LU 660Nitrate · 1.6 mi
- TV HARDWARE DISTRIBUTION LLCBrownfields · 1.6 mi
- NELLY TRAVEL PLAZAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- PHYSICAL PLT SVC BLDG 1Underground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- SPREETAIL PA FACILITYBrownfields · 1.7 mi
- EXXON RS 2 3409Underground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Luzerne 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 Luzerne County.
Severity Distribution
across Luzerne 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 Luzerne 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 Luzerne County average
Your land is one point inside Luzerne County
Everything above resolves to Luzerne County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 569K 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 Luzerne County Average
Luzerne County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Luzerne County
- ●One soil character for all of Luzerne County
- ●Frost dates read at Luzerne County's scale: Apr 11 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Luzerne County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Luzerne County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Luzerne County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Luzerne County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Luzerne County average
How we know this about Luzerne 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 Luzerne County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Luzerne County
When does frost risk typically end in Luzerne County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Luzerne 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 Luzerne County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Luzerne County sees about 200 frost-free days — roughly Apr 11 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 2 to Oct 14, about 165 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Luzerne County?
The federal record around Luzerne County runs heavier than most — 1,633 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (971), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 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 Luzerne County's scale — its 6b band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Luzerne 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 Luzerne County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Luzerne County's own scale — its own ~200-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 1,633 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Luzerne County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Luzerne County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Luzerne CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 1,633 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.0 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Luzerne County's boundary and the 569,476 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 3 ecoregions Luzerne County spans, Ridge and Valley the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Luzerne County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Luzerne 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 Luzerne County — the ~200 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 Luzerne County's 569,476 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 1,633 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 Luzerne Countyread your own land →