Stevens Creek, Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — 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, pawpaw, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Stevens Creek, 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 Stevens Creek 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 Stevens Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Stevens Creek — the short answer
Stevens Creek, Virginia: USDA zone 7a, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 435 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 435 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 Stevens Creek's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Stevens Creek's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Stevens Creek
Each reading below is measured for Stevens Creek itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredStevens Creek runs about 200 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
MeasuredStevens Creek 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 Stevens Creek is in
Stevens Creek sits in the Blue Ridge — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Stevens Creek's own centroid rather than borrowed from Grayson County.
What Grows in Stevens Creek
Every plant below cleared Stevens Creek's own zone 7a and its 200-day season. Each card opens that plant's Virginia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Stevens Creek?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Stevens Creek
Spotted lanternfly documented 10 miles from Stevens Creek, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Stevens Creek
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Stevens Creek. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PROVIDENCE LUMBER COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- TOWN OF FRIES - TOWN SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- WASTE WATER TREATMENT PLANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- C H PorterUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Gerald Colemans StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- MOUNT VERNON MILLSSuperfund · 0.8 mi
- Double AA Mart LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Fries Volunteer Fire DepartmentUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- B and P Chevron StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Green Valley GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- A and M GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- RIEGEL TEXTILE CORPBrownfields · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Stevens Creek'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 Stevens Creek.
Total Sites
285
within ~10 miles of Stevens Creek
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Stevens Creek
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Stevens Creek
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Stevens Creek, Mining runs higher than the national average — 69 sites within ~10 miles of Stevens Creek. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Stevens Creek
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 Stevens Creek average
Your land is one point inside Stevens Creek
Everything above resolves to Stevens Creek as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 435 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 Stevens Creek Average
Stevens Creek Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Stevens Creek
- ●One soil character for all of Stevens Creek
- ●Frost dates read at Stevens Creek's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Stevens Creek's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Stevens Creek
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Stevens Creek, Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Stevens Creek averages can't show:
We read public map data around Stevens Creek — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Stevens Creek average
How we know this about Stevens Creek
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 Stevens Creek’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 Stevens Creek
When does frost risk typically end in Stevens Creek?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Stevens Creek typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
When is the first frost in Stevens Creek?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Stevens Creek typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 200 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Stevens Creek?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Stevens Creek sees about 200 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 12, about 165 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Stevens Creek?
The federal record around Stevens Creek runs heavier than most — 285 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (154), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Stevens Creek?
From about Sep 26 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 Oct 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 Oct 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Stevens Creek's scale — its 7a band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Stevens Creek'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 Stevens Creek’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Stevens Creek's own scale — its own ~200-day season between 28°F freezes, the 435 acres it covers and 285 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Stevens Creek's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Stevens Creek's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 26 and the ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 285 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Stevens Creek, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Stevens Creek's boundary and the 435 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Stevens Creek's own centroid, the Blue RidgeUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Stevens Creeklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Stevens Creek's 435 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Grayson County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Grayson 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 Grayson County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Stevens Creek's 435 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Stevens Creek you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 435 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Stevens Creek-wide figureread your own land →
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