Hollymead, Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Growers here do well with cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Hollymead, 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 Hollymead 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 Hollymead — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Hollymead — the short answer
Hollymead, Virginia: USDA zone 7b, about 222 days between hard freezes, across 4K 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 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~222
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 4K 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 Hollymead's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Hollymead's 222-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Hollymead
Each reading below is measured for Hollymead itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHollymead runs about 222 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
MeasuredHollymead 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 Hollymead is in
Hollymead sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Hollymead's own centroid rather than borrowed from Albemarle County.
What Grows in Hollymead
Every plant below cleared Hollymead's own zone 7b and its 222-day season. Each card opens that plant's Virginia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Hollymead?
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 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 Hollymead
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Hollymead, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Hollymead
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Hollymead. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- HOLLY MEMORIAL GARDENSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- MAUPINS GROCERY / PINE GROVE SVCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- HARRIS TEETER 132Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- CVS PHARMACY #16978Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- TARGET STORE T1858Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- The Market at Forest LakesUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Everyday 3560Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- WAWA# 8659Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- RELIANT TRUCKS CORPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SHEETZ #728Brownfields · 0.8 mi
- AIRPORT ROAD AUTO CENTERBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- AIRPORT ROAD AUTO CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Hollymead'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 Hollymead.
Total Sites
526
within ~10 miles of Hollymead
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Hollymead
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Hollymead
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Hollymead, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 372 sites within ~10 miles of Hollymead. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Hollymead
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 Hollymead average
Your land is one point inside Hollymead
Everything above resolves to Hollymead as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 Hollymead Average
Hollymead Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Hollymead
- ●One soil character for all of Hollymead
- ●Frost dates read at Hollymead's scale: Mar 28 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Hollymead's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Hollymead
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Hollymead, Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Hollymead averages can't show:
We read public map data around Hollymead — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Hollymead average
How we know this about Hollymead
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 Hollymead’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 Hollymead
When does frost risk typically end in Hollymead?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Hollymead 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 Hollymead?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Hollymead 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 222 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Hollymead?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Hollymead sees about 222 frost-free days — roughly Mar 28 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 18 to Oct 22, about 187 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Hollymead?
The federal record around Hollymead is a meaningful one — 526 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (372), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Hollymead?
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 Hollymead's scale — its 7b band and its 222-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Hollymead'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 Hollymead’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Hollymead's own scale — its own ~222-day season between 28°F freezes, the 4,136 acres it covers and 526 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Hollymead's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Hollymead's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 28 and Nov 5 and the ~222-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 526 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Hollymead, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Hollymead's boundary and the 4,136 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~222-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Hollymead's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Hollymeadlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Hollymead's 4,136 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Albemarle County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Albemarle County
- The growing challenges every Virginia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Virginia
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Albemarle County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Hollymead's 4,136 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Hollymead you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 4,136 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Hollymead-wide figureread your own land →