York Springs, Pennsylvania, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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 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 York 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 York Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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York Springs — the short answer
York Springs, Pennsylvania: USDA zone 7a, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 127 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 127 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 Springs's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against York Springs's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in York Springs
Each reading below is measured for York Springs itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredYork Springs runs about 216 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 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 York Springs is in
York Springs sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at York Springs's own centroid rather than borrowed from Adams County.
What Grows in York Springs
Every plant below cleared York Springs's own zone 7a and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Pennsylvania profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in York Springs?
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 Mar 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 6 — 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 York Springs
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from York Springs, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near York Springs
Closest first, within ~10 miles of York Springs. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- YORK SPRINGS ELEM SCHUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- YORK SPRINGSUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- HUNTINGTON TWP MUNI BLDGUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- PAULS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- DOVER GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- WOLFS BUS LINESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- WOLF BUS LINESBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- SHELL TRUCK STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- YORK SPRINGS MUNI STPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- HIGHWAY EXPRESSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- LATIMORE TWP SPVRUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- LONNIE L SHULTZUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from York 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 York Springs.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of York Springs
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of York Springs
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around York Springs, CAFO runs higher than the national average — 16 sites within ~10 miles of York Springs. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around 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 York 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 York Springs average
Your land is one point inside York Springs
Everything above resolves to York Springs as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 127 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 York Springs Average
York Springs Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across York Springs
- ●One soil character for all of York Springs
- ●Frost dates read at York Springs's scale: Apr 4 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not York Springs's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in York Springs
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in York Springs, Pennsylvania — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that York Springs averages can't show:
We read public map data around York Springs — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the York Springs average
How we know this about York 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 York 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 York Springs
When does frost risk typically end in York Springs?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in York Springs typically lands around Apr 4, 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 25.
When is the first frost in York Springs?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in York Springs typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in York Springs?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, York Springs sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Apr 4 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 25 to Oct 23, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in York Springs?
The federal record around York Springs is a meaningful one — 315 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (170), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 York Springs?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at York Springs's scale — its 7a band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of York 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 York Springs’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at York Springs's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 127 acres it covers and 315 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- York Springs's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- York Springs's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 4 and Nov 6 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 315 documented contamination sites on the federal record near York Springs, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- York Springs's boundary and the 127 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at York Springs's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of York Springslydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so York Springs's 127 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Adams County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Adams 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 Adams County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among York Springs's 127 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of York 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 127 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 York Springs-wide figureread your own land →
More in Pennsylvania
Wider growing context
What grows across PennsylvaniaYork Springs sits outside our named growing regions, so Pennsylvania as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides