West Dunbar, West Virginia, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in West Dunbar, 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 West Dunbar 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 West Dunbar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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West Dunbar — the short answer
West Dunbar, West Virginia: USDA zone 7a, about 217 days between hard freezes, across 145 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- 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
- ~217
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 145 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 West Dunbar's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against West Dunbar's 217-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in West Dunbar
Each reading below is measured for West Dunbar itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredWest Dunbar runs about 217 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
MeasuredWest Dunbar 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 West Dunbar is in
West Dunbar sits in the Western Allegheny Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at West Dunbar's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Kanawha County is mostly Central Appalachians. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in West Dunbar
Every plant below cleared West Dunbar's own zone 7a and its 217-day season. Each card opens that plant's West Virginia profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in West Dunbar?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (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. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around West Dunbar
Survey cells within 31 miles of West Dunbar checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 106 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near West Dunbar
Closest first, within ~10 miles of West Dunbar. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T & W ENTERPRISESUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- PITT OHIO EXPRESSUnderground Storage Tanks · 550 ft
- RYDER TRUCK RENTAL #0492Brownfields · 1300 ft
- RYDER TRUCK RENTAL L#0492AUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- 4-D TRUCKING CO., INC.Brownfields · 1400 ft
- HUBERT JONES INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- CHARLESTON STEELBrownfields · 1500 ft
- WV PAVING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- AJAX PIPE LINE COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- DUNBAR STORAGE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- KCS BEN FRANKLIN CAREER CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- CITY OF DUNBAR GARAGEBrownfields · 1700 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from West Dunbar'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 West Dunbar.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of West Dunbar
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of West Dunbar
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around West Dunbar, Superfund runs higher than the national average — 18 sites within ~10 miles of West Dunbar. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in West Dunbar
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 West Dunbar average
Your land is one point inside West Dunbar
Everything above resolves to West Dunbar as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 145 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 West Dunbar Average
West Dunbar Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across West Dunbar
- ●One soil character for all of West Dunbar
- ●Frost dates read at West Dunbar's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not West Dunbar's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in West Dunbar
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in West Dunbar, West Virginia — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that West Dunbar averages can't show:
We read public map data around West Dunbar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the West Dunbar average
How we know this about West Dunbar
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 West Dunbar’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 West Dunbar
When does frost risk typically end in West Dunbar?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in West Dunbar typically lands around Apr 2, 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 23.
When is the first frost in West Dunbar?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in West Dunbar 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 217 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in West Dunbar?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, West Dunbar sees about 217 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 22, about 182 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in West Dunbar?
The federal record around West Dunbar is a meaningful one — 1,195 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (644), 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 West Dunbar?
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 West Dunbar's scale — its 7a band and its 217-day season. Your yard writes its own version of West Dunbar'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 West Dunbar’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at West Dunbar's own scale — its own ~217-day season between 28°F freezes, the 145 acres it covers and 1,195 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- West Dunbar's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- West Dunbar's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 5 and the ~217-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,195 documented contamination sites on the federal record near West Dunbar, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- West Dunbar's boundary and the 145 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~217-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- West Dunbar sits in the Western Allegheny Plateau — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around West Dunbar 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 West Dunbar's 145 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Kanawha County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Kanawha 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 Kanawha County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among West Dunbar's 145 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of West Dunbar you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 145 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 West Dunbar-wide figureread your own land →