Cedar Lake, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Expect cabbage, blueberry, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cedar Lake, 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 Cedar Lake 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 Cedar Lake — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cedar Lake — the short answer
Cedar Lake, Indiana: USDA zone 5b, about 206 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~206
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 6K 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 5b is Cedar Lake's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cedar Lake's 206-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cedar Lake
Each reading below is measured for Cedar Lake itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCedar Lake runs about 206 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
MeasuredCedar Lake sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Cedar Lake is in
Cedar Lake sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cedar Lake's own centroid rather than borrowed from Lake County.
What Grows in Cedar Lake
Every plant below cleared Cedar Lake's own zone 5b and its 206-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cedar Lake?
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 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 11 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 3 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Cedar Lake
Spotted lanternfly documented 26 miles from Cedar Lake, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cedar Lake
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cedar Lake. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CEDAR LAKE LUMBER COMPANY INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- EVANS AUTOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- CEDAR LAKE PUBLIC WORKSBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- AMOCO NO 10020Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- CEDAR LAKE PUBLIC WORKSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ARCO CAR WASHUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Hanover Central Junior Senior High School 3785Underground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- CEDAR LAKE PUBLIC SAFETY CENTERBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- CASEY GENERAL STORE 2193Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- SIMONS AUTO PARTS CLOSEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- GRAND RAPIDS SASH & DOOR COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CITGO WILKESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cedar Lake'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 Cedar Lake.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cedar Lake
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cedar Lake
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cedar Lake, PFAS runs higher than the national average — 12 sites within ~10 miles of Cedar Lake. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Cedar Lake
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 Cedar Lake average
Your land is one point inside Cedar Lake
Everything above resolves to Cedar Lake as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 6K 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 Cedar Lake Average
Cedar Lake Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Cedar Lake
- ●One soil character for all of Cedar Lake
- ●Frost dates read at Cedar Lake's scale: Apr 11 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cedar Lake's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cedar Lake
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cedar Lake, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cedar Lake averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cedar Lake — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cedar Lake average
How we know this about Cedar Lake
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 Cedar Lake’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 Cedar Lake
When does frost risk typically end in Cedar Lake?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cedar Lake typically lands around Apr 11, 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 May 2.
When is the first frost in Cedar Lake?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cedar Lake typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 206 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cedar Lake?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cedar Lake sees about 206 frost-free days — roughly Apr 11 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 2 to Oct 20, about 171 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cedar Lake?
The federal record around Cedar Lake is a meaningful one — 549 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (265), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Cedar Lake?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cedar Lake's scale — its 5b band and its 206-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cedar Lake'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 Cedar Lake’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cedar Lake's own scale — its own ~206-day season between 28°F freezes, the 6,049 acres it covers and 549 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cedar Lake's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cedar Lake's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 11 and Nov 3 and the ~206-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 549 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cedar Lake, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cedar Lake's boundary and the 6,049 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~206-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cedar Lake's own centroid, the Central Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Cedar Lakelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cedar Lake's 6,049 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lake County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lake 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 Lake County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cedar Lake's 6,049 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cedar Lake you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 6,049 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Cedar Lake-wide figureread your own land →