Rose Valley, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Rose Valley, 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 Rose Valley 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 Rose Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Rose Valley — the short answer
Rose Valley, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7b, about 252 days between hard freezes, across 468 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~252
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 468 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 7b is Rose Valley's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Rose Valley's 252-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Rose Valley
Each reading below is measured for Rose Valley itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRose Valley runs about 252 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
MeasuredRose Valley sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Rose Valley is in
Rose Valley sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Rose Valley's own centroid rather than borrowed from Delaware County.
What Grows in Rose Valley
Every plant below cleared Rose Valley's own zone 7b and its 252-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Rose Valley?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 19 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 26 — 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 Rose Valley
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Rose Valley, first recorded 2017. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Rose Valley
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Rose Valley. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- HIGHWAY DEPT GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SACKVILLE MILLS CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- STRATH HAVEN MID SCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- WLC BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- ENG DIST 6 0 MAINT BLDG 630Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- NILON RESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- WILSON OF WALLINGFORDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- BIRL C CLARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- MCNULTY BULK TRANSPORT INCBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- K MART 3392Underground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- LOWES OF BROOKHAVEN PA #3277Brownfields · 1.3 mi
- SPRINGHAVEN CLUBUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Rose Valley'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 Rose Valley.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Rose Valley
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Rose Valley
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Rose Valley, Superfund runs higher than the national average — 45 sites within ~10 miles of Rose Valley. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Rose Valley
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 Rose Valley average
Your land is one point inside Rose Valley
Everything above resolves to Rose Valley as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 468 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 Rose Valley Average
Rose Valley Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Rose Valley
- ●One soil character for all of Rose Valley
- ●Frost dates read at Rose Valley's scale: Mar 19 to Nov 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Rose Valley's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Rose Valley
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Rose Valley, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Rose Valley averages can't show:
We read public map data around Rose Valley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Rose Valley average
How we know this about Rose Valley
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 Rose Valley’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 Rose Valley
When does frost risk typically end in Rose Valley?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Rose Valley typically lands around Mar 19, 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 9.
When is the first frost in Rose Valley?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Rose Valley typically arrives around Nov 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 12, so the watching starts about Oct 27 — about 252 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Rose Valley?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Rose Valley sees about 252 frost-free days — roughly Mar 19 through Nov 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 9 to Nov 12, about 217 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Rose Valley?
The federal record around Rose Valley runs heavier than most — 2,932 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,314), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Rose Valley?
From about Oct 27 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Rose Valley's scale — its 7b band and its 252-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Rose Valley'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 Rose Valley’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Rose Valley's own scale — its own ~252-day season between 28°F freezes, the 468 acres it covers and 2,932 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Rose Valley's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Rose Valley's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 19 and Nov 26 and the ~252-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,932 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Rose Valley, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Rose Valley's boundary and the 468 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~252-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Rose Valley's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Rose Valleylydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Rose Valley's 468 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Delaware County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Delaware 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 Delaware County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Rose Valley's 468 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Rose Valley you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 468 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Rose Valley-wide figureread your own land →
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