Fort Lauderdale, Florida, sits in USDA hardiness zone 11a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Crops well matched to these conditions include artichoke, starfruit, allspice, and cabbage — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Fort Lauderdale, 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 Fort Lauderdale 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 Fort Lauderdale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Fort Lauderdale — the short answer
Fort Lauderdale, Florida: USDA zone 11a, no 28°F killing freeze on record — the season is year-round, across 22K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 11a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Killing freeze
- None on record
- NOAA RCC ACIS 1991–2020, this town’s own record
- City area
- 22K 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 11a is Fort Lauderdale's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fort Lauderdale'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 Fort Lauderdale
Each reading below is measured for Fort Lauderdale itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Winter hardiness
MeasuredFort Lauderdale sits in USDA hardiness zone 11a.
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 Fort Lauderdale is in
Fort Lauderdale sits in the Southern Florida Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Tropical Wet Forests. That is read at Fort Lauderdale's own centroid rather than borrowed from Broward County.
What Grows in Fort Lauderdale
Every plant below cleared Fort Lauderdale's own zone 11a. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
What's on the federal record near Fort Lauderdale
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Fort Lauderdale. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- UNION 76 #9270-305Underground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- NORTHEAST AUTO & FOODUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- WALGREENS STORE #4597Brownfields · 1800 ft
- WAWA #5303Brownfields · 1800 ft
- MODPOD DEVELOPMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- A & B AUTO BODY & PAINTING INCBrownfields · 2000 ft
- JIFFY LUBE #229Underground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- CIRCLE K #1879Brownfields · 2000 ft
- EXXON #6223Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- HAMOFA INDUSTRIAL ENGINESBrownfields · 2100 ft
- JIFFY LUBE STORE #229Brownfields · 2100 ft
- TENNECO #63Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fort Lauderdale'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 Fort Lauderdale.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Fort Lauderdale
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Fort Lauderdale
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.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Fort Lauderdale
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 Fort Lauderdale average
Your land is one point inside Fort Lauderdale
Everything above resolves to Fort Lauderdale as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 22K 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 city 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 Fort Lauderdale Average
Fort Lauderdale Average
- ●USDA Zones 11a, averaged across Fort Lauderdale
- ●One soil character for all of Fort Lauderdale
- ●State-average frost dates
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fort Lauderdale's 11a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Fort Lauderdale
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fort Lauderdale, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fort Lauderdale averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fort Lauderdale — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fort Lauderdale average
How we know this about Fort Lauderdale
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Fort Lauderdale
Is it too late to plant in Fort Lauderdale?
No — Fort Lauderdale 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 Fort Lauderdale?
It doesn't — Fort Lauderdale 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 Fort Lauderdale?
Year-round — the 1991–2020 station record for Fort Lauderdale 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 Fort Lauderdale?
The federal record around Fort Lauderdale runs heavier than most — 3,856 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,934), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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.
Everything above is measured at Fort Lauderdale's scale — its 11a band and its no killing freeze on record. Your yard writes its own version of Fort Lauderdale'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 Fort Lauderdale’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Fort Lauderdale's own scale — the 22,132 acres it covers and 3,856 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fort Lauderdale's own USDA hardiness band, zones 11aUSDA PHZM 2023
- No 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record covering Fort Lauderdale — a year-round growing seasonNOAA Regional Climate Centers ACIS, 1991-2020
- 3,856 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Fort Lauderdale, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Fort Lauderdale's boundary and the 22,132 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear Fort Lauderdale's hardiness zoneGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Fort Lauderdale'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 Fort Lauderdale's 22,132 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Broward County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Broward 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 Broward County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Fort Lauderdale's 22,132 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Fort Lauderdale you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 22,132 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 Fort Lauderdale-wide figureread your own land →
More in Florida
Wider growing context
What grows across FloridaFort Lauderdale sits outside our named growing regions, so Florida as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides