Bethel Village, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Bethel Village, 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 Bethel Village 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 Bethel Village — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Bethel Village — the short answer
Bethel Village, Indiana: USDA zone 6b, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 84 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- 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
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 84 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 Bethel Village's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bethel Village's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bethel Village
Each reading below is measured for Bethel Village itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBethel Village runs about 219 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
MeasuredBethel Village 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 Bethel Village is in
Bethel Village sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bethel Village's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bartholomew County.
What Grows in Bethel Village
Every plant below cleared Bethel Village's own zone 6b and its 219-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bethel Village?
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 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (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. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Bethel Village
Survey cells within 31 miles of Bethel Village checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 57 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Bethel Village
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bethel Village. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JOHNSON OIL COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- BARTHOLOMEW 8 (BA 8)Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- FIRST METAL AND PLASTICBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- First Metal & Plastics Technologies IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Flos DinerUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- CUIUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- AK TUBE LLCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- AK TUBE LLCToxics Release Inventory · 1.1 mi
- Walesboro AirportUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- NINTH AVE FOODS EASTToxics Release Inventory · 1.2 mi
- COLUMBUS PUMP TEST WELLNitrate · 1.2 mi
- CUMMINS, INC.Brownfields · 1.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bethel Village'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 Bethel Village.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bethel Village
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bethel Village
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bethel Village, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 39 sites within ~10 miles of Bethel Village. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Bethel Village
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 Bethel Village average
Your land is one point inside Bethel Village
Everything above resolves to Bethel Village as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 84 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 Bethel Village Average
Bethel Village Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Bethel Village
- ●One soil character for all of Bethel Village
- ●Frost dates read at Bethel Village's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bethel Village's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bethel Village
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bethel Village, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bethel Village averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bethel Village — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bethel Village average
How we know this about Bethel Village
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 Bethel Village’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 Bethel Village
When does frost risk typically end in Bethel Village?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bethel Village typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
When is the first frost in Bethel Village?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bethel Village 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 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bethel Village?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bethel Village sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Oct 22, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bethel Village?
The federal record around Bethel Village runs heavier than most — 417 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (222), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Bethel Village?
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 Bethel Village's scale — its 6b band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bethel Village'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 Bethel Village’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Bethel Village's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 84 acres it covers and 417 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bethel Village's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bethel Village's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 5 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 417 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bethel Village, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bethel Village's boundary and the 84 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bethel Village's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Bethel Village 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 Bethel Village's 84 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bartholomew County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bartholomew County
- The growing challenges every Indiana grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Indiana
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Bartholomew County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bethel Village's 84 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bethel Village you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 84 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Bethel Village-wide figureread your own land →