Highland Beach, 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 Highland Beach, 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 Highland Beach 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 Highland Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Highland Beach — the short answer
Highland Beach, Florida: USDA zone 11a, no 28°F killing freeze on record — the season is year-round, across 344 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 11a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Killing freeze
- None on record
- NOAA RCC ACIS 1991–2020, this town’s own record
- Town area
- 344 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 Highland Beach's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Highland Beach'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 Highland Beach
Each reading below is measured for Highland Beach itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Winter hardiness
MeasuredHighland Beach 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 Highland Beach is in
Highland Beach sits in the Southern Florida Coastal Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Tropical Wet Forests. That is read at Highland Beach's own centroid rather than borrowed from Palm Beach County.
What Grows in Highland Beach
Every plant below cleared Highland Beach's own zone 11a. Each card opens that plant's Florida profile. How we score.
What's on the federal record near Highland Beach
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Highland Beach. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CASUARINA CONDOMINIUMUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- VILLA NOVAUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- HIGHLAND BEACH TOWNUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- CLARENDON CONDOUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- AMBASSADORS EAST CONDOMINIUMUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- REGENCY HIGHLANDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- BEACH WALK EASTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- OCEAN DUNESUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HIGHLAND BEACH TOWN-WTPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- TRAFALGAR CONDOMINIUMSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- PUBLIX SUPER MARKET #369Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- FLORIDA DEP DSCP D084 #509500969Brownfields · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Highland Beach'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 Highland Beach.
Total Sites
1,578
within ~10 miles of Highland Beach
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
5 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Highland Beach
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Highland Beach
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 Highland Beach
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 Highland Beach average
Your land is one point inside Highland Beach
Everything above resolves to Highland Beach as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 344 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 Highland Beach Average
Highland Beach Average
- ●USDA Zones 11a, averaged across Highland Beach
- ●One soil character for all of Highland Beach
- ●State-average frost dates
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Highland Beach's 11a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Highland Beach
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Highland Beach, Florida — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Highland Beach averages can't show:
We read public map data around Highland Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Highland Beach average
How we know this about Highland Beach
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 Highland Beach
Is it too late to plant in Highland Beach?
No — Highland Beach 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 Highland Beach?
It doesn't — Highland Beach 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 Highland Beach?
Year-round — the 1991–2020 station record for Highland Beach 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 Highland Beach?
The federal record around Highland Beach is a meaningful one — 1,578 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (782), 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.
Everything above is measured at Highland Beach's scale — its 11a band and its no killing freeze on record. Your yard writes its own version of Highland Beach'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 Highland Beach’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Highland Beach's own scale — the 344 acres it covers and 1,578 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Highland Beach's own USDA hardiness band, zones 11aUSDA PHZM 2023
- No 28°F killing freeze in the 30-year station record covering Highland Beach — a year-round growing seasonNOAA Regional Climate Centers ACIS, 1991-2020
- 1,578 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Highland Beach, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Highland Beach's boundary and the 344 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear Highland Beach's hardiness zoneGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Highland Beach'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 Highland Beach's 344 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Palm Beach County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Palm Beach 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 Palm Beach County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Highland Beach's 344 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Highland Beach you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 344 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 Highland Beach-wide figureread your own land →