Willow Grove, 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.
These conditions suit cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Willow Grove, 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 Willow Grove 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 Willow Grove — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Willow Grove — the short answer
Willow Grove, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7b, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 Willow Grove's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Willow Grove's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Willow Grove
Each reading below is measured for Willow Grove itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredWillow Grove runs about 232 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
MeasuredWillow Grove 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 Willow Grove is in
Willow Grove sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Willow Grove's own centroid rather than borrowed from Montgomery County.
What Grows in Willow Grove
Every plant below cleared Willow Grove's own zone 7b and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Willow Grove?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 28; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 28 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 15 — 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 Willow Grove
Spotted lanternfly documented 4 miles from Willow Grove, first recorded 2018. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Willow Grove
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Willow Grove. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- HOME DEPOT USA INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- ST DAVIDS CATH CHUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- ST DAVIDS CATH SCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- CALVARY PRESB CHUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- WILLOW GROVE CTL OFCUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- TOM SAWYER AUTO REPAIRUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- PRECISION TUNE LOCATION 2074Underground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- GIANT FOOD STORE 6654Underground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- WAWA 8063Underground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- WAWA FOOD MARKET NO 8063Brownfields · 1100 ft
- AMAZON FRESH MAG9Brownfields · 1200 ft
- GUY M COOPERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Willow Grove'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 Willow Grove.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Willow Grove
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Willow Grove
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 Willow Grove
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 Willow Grove average
Your land is one point inside Willow Grove
Everything above resolves to Willow Grove as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Willow Grove Average
Willow Grove Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Willow Grove
- ●One soil character for all of Willow Grove
- ●Frost dates read at Willow Grove's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Willow Grove's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Willow Grove
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Willow Grove averages can't show:
We read public map data around Willow Grove — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Willow Grove average
How we know this about Willow Grove
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 Willow Grove’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 Willow Grove
When does frost risk typically end in Willow Grove?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Willow Grove typically lands around Mar 28, 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 18.
When is the first frost in Willow Grove?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Willow Grove typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Willow Grove?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Willow Grove sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Nov 1, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Willow Grove?
The federal record around Willow Grove runs heavier than most — 3,789 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,858), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Willow Grove?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Willow Grove's scale — its 7b band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Willow Grove'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 Willow Grove’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Willow Grove's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,628 acres it covers and 3,789 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Willow Grove's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Willow Grove's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 28 and Nov 15 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 3,789 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Willow Grove, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Willow Grove's boundary and the 1,628 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Willow Grove's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Willow Grovelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Willow Grove's 1,628 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Montgomery County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Montgomery 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 Montgomery County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Willow Grove's 1,628 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Willow Grove you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,628 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Willow Grove-wide figureread your own land →
More in Pennsylvania
Wider growing context
What grows across PennsylvaniaWillow Grove sits outside our named growing regions, so Pennsylvania as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides