Kanawha, West Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Kanawha, 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 Kanawha 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 Kanawha — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Kanawha — the short answer
Kanawha, West Virginia: USDA zone 6b, about 214 days between hard freezes, across 561 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- 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 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~214
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 561 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 6b is Kanawha's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Kanawha's 214-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Kanawha
Each reading below is measured for Kanawha itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredKanawha runs about 214 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
MeasuredKanawha sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Kanawha is in
Kanawha sits in the Western Allegheny Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Kanawha's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wood County.
What Grows in Kanawha
Every plant below cleared Kanawha's own zone 6b and its 214-day season. Each card opens that plant's West Virginia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Kanawha?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 3 — 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 Kanawha
Survey cells within 31 miles of Kanawha checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 59 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Kanawha
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Kanawha. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- REED'S QUAKER STATE (*SJ/REG93/CAP)Underground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- KIRKS IGAUnderground Storage Tanks · 2400 ft
- FOAMCOAT ROOFING & COATINGSBrownfields · 2600 ft
- GO MART # 122Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- RICKS TRANSMISSIONBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- TRI-STATE ROOFING & SHEET METALBrownfields · 1.6 mi
- TRI-ST ROOFING & SHEET METAL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- AMAZON.COM SERVICES LLC - WWV9Brownfields · 1.7 mi
- Woo-0051Nitrate · 1.8 mi
- CARL KELLY PAVING 476-0368475Underground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- AMES DISTRIBUTION CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- FORMER EXXON R/S #2-0445Underground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Kanawha'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 Kanawha.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Kanawha
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Kanawha
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.
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
Check your specific parcel in Kanawha
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 Kanawha average
Your land is one point inside Kanawha
Everything above resolves to Kanawha as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 561 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 Kanawha Average
Kanawha Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Kanawha
- ●One soil character for all of Kanawha
- ●Frost dates read at Kanawha's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Kanawha's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Kanawha
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Kanawha, West Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Kanawha averages can't show:
We read public map data around Kanawha — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Kanawha average
How we know this about Kanawha
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 Kanawha’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 Kanawha
When does frost risk typically end in Kanawha?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Kanawha 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 Kanawha?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Kanawha typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 214 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Kanawha?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Kanawha sees about 214 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 20, about 179 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Kanawha?
The federal record around Kanawha is a meaningful one — 647 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (372), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Kanawha?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Kanawha's scale — its 6b band and its 214-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Kanawha'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 Kanawha’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Kanawha's own scale — its own ~214-day season between 28°F freezes, the 561 acres it covers and 647 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Kanawha's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Kanawha's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 3 and the ~214-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 647 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Kanawha, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Kanawha's boundary and the 561 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~214-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Kanawha's own centroid, the Western Allegheny PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Kanawha checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Kanawha's 561 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wood County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wood County
- The growing challenges every West Virginia grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom West Virginia
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Wood County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Kanawha's 561 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Kanawha you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 561 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Kanawha-wide figureread your own land →