York, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in York, 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 York 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 York — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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York — the short answer
York, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 218 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- 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
- ~218
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 3K 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 York's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against York's 218-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in York
Each reading below is measured for York itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredYork runs about 218 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
MeasuredYork 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 York is in
York sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at York's own centroid rather than borrowed from York County.
What Grows in York
Every plant below cleared York's own zone 7a and its 218-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in York?
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 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (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. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around York
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from York, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near York
Closest first, within ~10 miles of York. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KEYSTONE COLOR WORKS INCBrownfields · 150 ft
- KEYSTONE COLOR WORKS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- ST JOHN EPISC CHUnderground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- HEIDELBERG UNITED CH OF CHRISTUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- WYASD WHSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- GTE NORTH INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- SMALLS FIELDBrownfields · 950 ft
- WHITE ROSE AMBULUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- COLUMBIA GAS PAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- YORK BANK & TRUST COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- KEMPS FOODSToxics Release Inventory · 1300 ft
- PAARNG YORK GEORGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from York'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 York.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of York
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of York
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around York, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 136 sites within ~10 miles of York. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in York
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 York average
Your land is one point inside York
Everything above resolves to York as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 3K 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 city 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 York Average
York Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across York
- ●One soil character for all of York
- ●Frost dates read at York's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not York's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in York
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in York, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that York averages can't show:
We read public map data around York — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the York average
How we know this about York
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at York’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 York
When does frost risk typically end in York?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in York typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in York?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in York 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 218 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in York?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, York sees about 218 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 24, about 183 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in York?
The federal record around York runs heavier than most — 1,374 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (724), the nearest Brownfields 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 York?
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 York's scale — its 7a band and its 218-day season. Your yard writes its own version of York'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 York’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at York's own scale — its own ~218-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,387 acres it covers and 1,374 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- York's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- York's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 7 and the ~218-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,374 documented contamination sites on the federal record near York, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- York's boundary and the 3,387 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~218-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at York's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Yorklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so York's 3,387 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom York County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom York 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 York County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among York's 3,387 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of York you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,387 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 York-wide figureread your own land →
More in Pennsylvania
Wider growing context
What grows across PennsylvaniaYork sits outside our named growing regions, so Pennsylvania as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides