Pen Mar, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Pen Mar, 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 Pen Mar 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 Pen Mar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Pen Mar — the short answer
Pen Mar, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 212 days between hard freezes, across 473 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~212
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 473 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 Pen Mar's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pen Mar's 212-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Pen Mar
Each reading below is measured for Pen Mar itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPen Mar runs about 212 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
MeasuredPen Mar 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 Pen Mar is in
Pen Mar sits in the Blue Ridge — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Pen Mar's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Franklin County is mostly Ridge and Valley. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Pen Mar
Every plant below cleared Pen Mar's own zone 7a and its 212-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Pen Mar?
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 10; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — 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 Pen Mar
Spotted lanternfly documented 1 miles from Pen Mar, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Pen Mar
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Pen Mar. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PEN MAR PUMPING STAUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- PEN (Pen Mar Park)Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- HENRY O SMITH ESTATEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- MCLAUGHLIN HOME HEATINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- GEESAMAN ROCK CONSTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- HIGHWAY EXPRESSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- BITTNER BOYS INC THEBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- 7 ELEVEN 28211Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- SHEETZ 401Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- WALMART SUPERCENTER NO 3633Brownfields · 1.1 mi
- LOWES OF WAYNESBORO PA #2228Brownfields · 1.1 mi
- FMR CAO GASUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pen Mar'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 Pen Mar.
Total Sites
391
within ~10 miles of Pen Mar
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Pen Mar
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Pen Mar
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pen Mar, CAFO runs higher than the national average — 5 sites within ~10 miles of Pen Mar. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Pen Mar
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 Pen Mar average
Your land is one point inside Pen Mar
Everything above resolves to Pen Mar as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 473 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 Pen Mar Average
Pen Mar Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Pen Mar
- ●One soil character for all of Pen Mar
- ●Frost dates read at Pen Mar's scale: Apr 7 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pen Mar's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Pen Mar
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pen Mar, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pen Mar averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pen Mar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pen Mar average
How we know this about Pen Mar
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 Pen Mar’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 Pen Mar
When does frost risk typically end in Pen Mar?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pen Mar typically lands around Apr 7, 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 28.
When is the first frost in Pen Mar?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Pen Mar typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 212 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Pen Mar?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pen Mar sees about 212 frost-free days — roughly Apr 7 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 28 to Oct 22, about 177 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pen Mar?
The federal record around Pen Mar is a meaningful one — 391 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (189), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Pen Mar?
From about Oct 6 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 5 (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 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Pen Mar's scale — its 7a band and its 212-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pen Mar'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 Pen Mar’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Pen Mar's own scale — its own ~212-day season between 28°F freezes, the 473 acres it covers and 391 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pen Mar's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pen Mar's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 7 and Nov 5 and the ~212-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 391 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Pen Mar, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Pen Mar's boundary and the 473 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~212-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Pen Mar sits in the Blue Ridge — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Pen Marlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Pen Mar's 473 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Franklin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Franklin 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 Franklin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Pen Mar's 473 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Pen Mar you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 473 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Pen Mar-wide figureread your own land →