Brownsburg, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Brownsburg, 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 Brownsburg 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 Brownsburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Brownsburg — the short answer
Brownsburg, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 11K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- 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
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 11K 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 6a is Brownsburg's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Brownsburg's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Brownsburg
Each reading below is measured for Brownsburg itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBrownsburg runs about 216 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
MeasuredBrownsburg sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Brownsburg is in
Brownsburg sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Brownsburg's own centroid rather than borrowed from Hendricks County.
What Grows in Brownsburg
Every plant below cleared Brownsburg's own zone 6a and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Brownsburg?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (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 Brownsburg
Survey cells within 31 miles of Brownsburg checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 61 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Brownsburg
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Brownsburg. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Main Street BPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- Brownsburg Shopping CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Speedway 4018Underground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- LEVOLD COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- FAMILY DOLLARUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- WOODS ALITECToxics Release Inventory · 1700 ft
- WOODS ALITECBrownfields · 1700 ft
- ILIFF CLEANERSBrownfields · 1700 ft
- Blanck Chevrolet Company IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- BROWNSBURG AUTOMOTIVE SUPPLYBrownfields · 2100 ft
- GERBER COLLISION & GLASS - BROWNSBURGBrownfields · 2300 ft
- GAS HOUSE USAUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Brownsburg'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 Brownsburg.
Total Sites
1,309
within ~10 miles of Brownsburg
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
6 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Brownsburg
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Brownsburg
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Brownsburg, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 106 sites within ~10 miles of Brownsburg. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
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 Brownsburg
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 Brownsburg average
Your land is one point inside Brownsburg
Everything above resolves to Brownsburg as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 11K 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 Brownsburg Average
Brownsburg Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Brownsburg
- ●One soil character for all of Brownsburg
- ●Frost dates read at Brownsburg's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Brownsburg's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Brownsburg
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Brownsburg, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Brownsburg averages can't show:
We read public map data around Brownsburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Brownsburg average
How we know this about Brownsburg
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 Brownsburg’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 Brownsburg
When does frost risk typically end in Brownsburg?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Brownsburg typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Brownsburg?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Brownsburg 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 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Brownsburg?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Brownsburg sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 22, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Brownsburg?
The federal record around Brownsburg is a meaningful one — 1,309 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (616), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Brownsburg?
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 Brownsburg's scale — its 6a band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Brownsburg'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 Brownsburg’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Brownsburg's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 10,881 acres it covers and 1,309 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Brownsburg's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Brownsburg's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 5 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,309 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Brownsburg, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Brownsburg's boundary and the 10,881 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Brownsburg's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Brownsburg 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 Brownsburg's 10,881 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Hendricks County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Hendricks 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 Hendricks County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Brownsburg's 10,881 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Brownsburg you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 10,881 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Brownsburg-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaBrownsburg sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.