Cranesville, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cranesville, 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 Cranesville 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 Cranesville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cranesville — the short answer
Cranesville, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 6a, about 202 days between hard freezes, across 598 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~202
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 598 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 6a is Cranesville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cranesville's 202-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cranesville
Each reading below is measured for Cranesville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCranesville runs about 202 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
MeasuredCranesville 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 Cranesville is in
Cranesville sits in the Erie Drift Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cranesville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Erie County.
What Grows in Cranesville
Every plant below cleared Cranesville's own zone 6a and its 202-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cranesville?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Cranesville
Spotted lanternfly documented 1 miles from Cranesville, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cranesville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cranesville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ELK CREEK TWP ERIE CNTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- JEPSON PRECISION TOOL INCBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- ER 176Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- DUDAS SVCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- KRISE BUS SVCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- ALBION MAINTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- ALBION BOROUGH GARAGEBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- ALBION BORO GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- ROGERS BROTHERS CORPBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- ROGERS BROTHERS CORPToxics Release Inventory · 1.4 mi
- NORTHWESTERN SD BUS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- ER 62Nitrate · 1.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cranesville'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 Cranesville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cranesville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cranesville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cranesville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Cranesville — PFAS (4 sites) and Nitrate (84 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Cranesville
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 Cranesville average
Your land is one point inside Cranesville
Everything above resolves to Cranesville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 598 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 Cranesville Average
Cranesville Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Cranesville
- ●One soil character for all of Cranesville
- ●Frost dates read at Cranesville's scale: Apr 20 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cranesville's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cranesville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cranesville, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cranesville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cranesville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cranesville average
How we know this about Cranesville
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 Cranesville’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 Cranesville
When does frost risk typically end in Cranesville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cranesville typically lands around Apr 20, 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 11.
When is the first frost in Cranesville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cranesville typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 202 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cranesville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cranesville sees about 202 frost-free days — roughly Apr 20 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 11 to Oct 25, about 167 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cranesville?
The federal record around Cranesville is a meaningful one — 252 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (84), 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 Cranesville?
From about Oct 9 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 8 (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 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cranesville's scale — its 6a band and its 202-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cranesville'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 Cranesville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cranesville's own scale — its own ~202-day season between 28°F freezes, the 598 acres it covers and 252 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cranesville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cranesville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 20 and Nov 8 and the ~202-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 252 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cranesville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cranesville's boundary and the 598 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~202-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cranesville's own centroid, the Erie Drift PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Cranesvillelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cranesville's 598 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Erie County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Erie 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 Erie County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cranesville's 598 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cranesville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 598 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 Cranesville-wide figureread your own land →
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