Berkshire Lakes, Florida, sits in USDA hardiness zone 10b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
The conditions favor artichoke, meyer lemon, california poppy, and cabbage, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Berkshire Lakes, 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 Berkshire Lakes 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 Berkshire Lakes — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Berkshire Lakes — the short answer
Berkshire Lakes, Florida: USDA zone 10b, no 28°F killing freeze on record — the season is year-round, across 420 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 10b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Killing freeze
- None on record
- NOAA RCC ACIS 1991–2020, this town’s own record
- Town area
- 420 acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. The year-round finding is measured — a 30-year record with no 28°F killing freeze in it — never inferred from missing dates.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 10b is Berkshire Lakes's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Berkshire Lakes's no killing freeze on record, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Berkshire Lakes
Each reading below is measured for Berkshire Lakes itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBerkshire Lakes sits in USDA hardiness zone 10b.
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 Berkshire Lakes is in
Berkshire Lakes sits in the Southern Florida Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Tropical Wet Forests. That is read at Berkshire Lakes's own centroid rather than borrowed from Collier County.
What Grows in Berkshire Lakes
Every plant below cleared Berkshire Lakes's own zone 10b. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
What's on the federal record near Berkshire Lakes
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Berkshire Lakes. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- C - 175Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- BERKSHIRE DRY CLEANERS LAUNDRYBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- PUBLIX SUPER MARKET #410Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- 7-ELEVEN STORE #34816Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- WALGREENS STORE #2542Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- 1235 San Marcos BlvdNitrate · 0.7 mi
- SANTA BARBARA SHELLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- FOX FIRE COUNTRY CLUBUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- CIRCLE K #7331Underground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- GLEN EAGLE COUNTRY CLUBBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- 3135_66TH_ST_SWNitrate · 1.1 mi
- CCS-1Nitrate · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Berkshire Lakes'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 Berkshire Lakes.
Total Sites
1,021
within ~10 miles of Berkshire Lakes
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Berkshire Lakes
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Berkshire Lakes
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Berkshire Lakes, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 274 sites within ~10 miles of Berkshire Lakes. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Berkshire Lakes
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 Berkshire Lakes average
Your land is one point inside Berkshire Lakes
Everything above resolves to Berkshire Lakes as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 420 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 Berkshire Lakes Average
Berkshire Lakes Average
- ●USDA Zones 10b, averaged across Berkshire Lakes
- ●One soil character for all of Berkshire Lakes
- ●State-average frost dates
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Berkshire Lakes's 10b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Berkshire Lakes
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Berkshire Lakes, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Berkshire Lakes averages can't show:
We read public map data around Berkshire Lakes — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Berkshire Lakes average
How we know this about Berkshire Lakes
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, with the labelled statewide window where none resolves; 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 Berkshire Lakes
Is it too late to plant in Berkshire Lakes?
No — Berkshire Lakes has no 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record, so the growing season is year-round and there is no last-frost date to wait for. Planting is paced by rainfall, heat and daylength instead of by frost: start heat-lovers any month, and time cool-season crops (lettuce, brassicas, peas) for the cooler, wetter half of the year or for higher ground. Succession sowing every few weeks works all year, so the limit is what you can keep watered and harvested, not the calendar.
When does frost risk typically end in Berkshire Lakes?
It doesn't — Berkshire Lakes records no 28°F killing freeze at all across the 1991–2020 station record, so there is no spring frost date to plant after. Cold still matters with elevation: the higher you garden, the cooler the nights, and a few tropical crops sulk below about 60°F even where they never freeze.
How long is the growing season in Berkshire Lakes?
Year-round — the 1991–2020 station record for Berkshire Lakes contains no 28°F killing freeze, so there is no season to measure between freezes. What paces planting instead is heat, rainfall and daylength: the hottest, wettest stretch is the hard part for cool-season crops, not winter. Elevation is the one real exception — the higher you garden, the colder the nights get.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Berkshire Lakes?
The federal record around Berkshire Lakes is a meaningful one — 1,021 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (396), the nearest Nitrate 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.
Everything above is measured at Berkshire Lakes's scale — its 10b band and its no killing freeze on record. Your yard writes its own version of Berkshire Lakes'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 Berkshire Lakes’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Berkshire Lakes's own scale — the 420 acres it covers and 1,021 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Berkshire Lakes's own USDA hardiness band, zones 10bUSDA PHZM 2023
- No 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record covering Berkshire Lakes — a year-round growing seasonNOAA Regional Climate Centers ACIS, 1991-2020
- 1,021 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Berkshire Lakes, the closest Nitrate record about 0.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Berkshire Lakes's boundary and the 420 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear Berkshire Lakes's hardiness zoneGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Berkshire Lakes's own centroid, the Southern Florida Coastal PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Berkshire Lakes's 420 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Collier County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Collier County
- The growing challenges every Florida grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Florida
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Collier County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Berkshire Lakes's 420 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Berkshire Lakes you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 420 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Berkshire Lakes-wide figureread your own land →