Mount Holly Springs, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
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 Mount Holly Springs, 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 Mount Holly Springs 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 Mount Holly Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Mount Holly Springs — the short answer
Mount Holly Springs, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 870 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 870 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 Mount Holly Springs's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Mount Holly Springs's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Mount Holly Springs
Each reading below is measured for Mount Holly Springs itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMount Holly Springs 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
MeasuredMount Holly Springs 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 Mount Holly Springs is in
Mount Holly Springs sits in the Blue Ridge — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Mount Holly Springs's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Cumberland County is mostly Ridge and Valley. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Mount Holly Springs
Every plant below cleared Mount Holly Springs'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 Mount Holly Springs?
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 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 7 — 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 Mount Holly Springs
Spotted lanternfly documented 1 miles from Mount Holly Springs, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Mount Holly Springs
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Mount Holly Springs. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- AHLSTROM FILTRATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- MOUNT HOLLY SPRINGS SPEC PAPER INC/MT HOLLY SPRINGSToxics Release Inventory · 2000 ft
- SOUTH MIDDLETON TWP MUNI AUTH PUMPING STA 3Underground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- NATL WEATHER SVC RADAR SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- FAMILY DOLLAR STORE NO 8756Brownfields · 2600 ft
- PA DUTCH CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- AHLSTROM FILTRATION LLC-UTILITIESToxics Release Inventory · 0.9 mi
- GENON REMA MTN ELEC GENERATING STABrownfields · 0.9 mi
- SHEETZ 232Underground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- SHEETZ STORE NO 232Brownfields · 0.9 mi
- MT HOLLY SPRINGS WWTPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- UGOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Mount Holly Springs'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 Mount Holly Springs.
Total Sites
669
within ~10 miles of Mount Holly Springs
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Mount Holly Springs
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Mount Holly Springs
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Mount Holly Springs, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 214 sites within ~10 miles of Mount Holly Springs. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Mount Holly Springs
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 Mount Holly Springs average
Your land is one point inside Mount Holly Springs
Everything above resolves to Mount Holly Springs as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 870 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 Mount Holly Springs Average
Mount Holly Springs Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Mount Holly Springs
- ●One soil character for all of Mount Holly Springs
- ●Frost dates read at Mount Holly Springs's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Mount Holly Springs's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Mount Holly Springs
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Mount Holly Springs, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Mount Holly Springs averages can't show:
We read public map data around Mount Holly Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Mount Holly Springs average
How we know this about Mount Holly Springs
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 Mount Holly Springs’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 Mount Holly Springs
When does frost risk typically end in Mount Holly Springs?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Mount Holly Springs typically lands around Apr 2, 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 23.
When is the first frost in Mount Holly Springs?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Mount Holly Springs typically arrives around Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 24, so the watching starts about Oct 8 — about 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Mount Holly Springs?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Mount Holly Springs sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 24, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Mount Holly Springs?
The federal record around Mount Holly Springs is a meaningful one — 669 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (309), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Mount Holly Springs?
From about Oct 8 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 7 (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 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Mount Holly Springs's scale — its 7a band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Mount Holly Springs'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 Mount Holly Springs’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Mount Holly Springs's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 870 acres it covers and 669 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Mount Holly Springs's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Mount Holly Springs's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 7 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 669 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Mount Holly Springs, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Mount Holly Springs's boundary and the 870 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Mount Holly Springs sits in the Blue Ridge — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Mount Holly Springslydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Mount Holly Springs's 870 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Cumberland County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Cumberland 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 Cumberland County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Mount Holly Springs's 870 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Mount Holly Springs you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 870 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Mount Holly Springs-wide figureread your own land →