Jay County, in Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Jay County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Jay County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Jay County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Jay County — the short answer
Jay County, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 246K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 246K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 Jay County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Jay County's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Jay County
Across a year, Jay County accumulates about 2,954 growing degree days above 50°F, about 202 fewer than the middle Indiana county — ahead of 28 of Indiana’s 92 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Jay County
Across Jay County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Glynwood, Blount, and Saranac are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.4–6.5, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
27%
Hydric soils
28%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Jay County
The USDA soil survey maps 35% of Jay County as moderately well drained — but another 65% drains differently: 35% somewhat poorly drained, 29% very poorly drained.
Glynwood is the most extensive named soil at 38% of mapped acres, then Blount (29%) and Saranac (3%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Jay County
Each reading below is measured for Jay County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Jay County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group C/D — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Jay County runs about pH 6.4–6.5, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Wet ground
MeasuredAbout 28% of Jay County is mapped as hydric — wetland — soil.
If your lot falls in one of those pockets, a standard in-ground bed will fight waterlogging all season, and roots that need air will struggle.
Check how your own ground drains before you dig; raised beds or moisture-loving plantings turn a wet corner from a problem into a niche.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredJay County runs about 200 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
The kind of country Jay County is in
Jay County sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Jay County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Jay County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 200-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile.
Is it too late to plant in Jay County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 27 — 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 Jay County
Survey cells within 31 miles of Jay County checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 42 miles off. What to watch for.
What gets applied to farmland in Jay County
USGS estimates 189,299 lb of Glyphosate on Jay County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (79,173 lb) and Atrazine (69,737 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Jay County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Jay County — 136 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed). Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Jay County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Jay County
Closest first, across Jay County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MEXICAN ORIGINAL INC.- PORTLANDToxics Release Inventory · 1200 ft
- TYSON FOODS, INC. MEXICAN ORIGINALToxics Release Inventory · 1200 ft
- TYSON FOODS, INC. MEXICAN ORIGINALBrownfields · 1200 ft
- LIMESTONE PRODUCTS INCBrownfields · 1900 ft
- MARATHON BULK PLANTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- JA MAR APPLIANCE INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- MURPHY USA 7307Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- WALMART SUPERCENTER #2388Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- O CEDAR BRANDS INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Jay County Rural Electric Membership CorporationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Jay Petroleum IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- IU HEALTH JAY HOSPITALBrownfields · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Jay County'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 Jay County.
Sources Checked
across Jay County
Severity Distribution
across Jay County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Jay County, two things run higher than the national average across Jay County — Toxics Release Inventory (20 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (85 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Jay County
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 Jay County average
Your land is one point inside Jay County
Everything above resolves to Jay County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 246K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Jay County Average
Jay County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Jay County
- ●One soil character for all of Jay County
- ●Frost dates read at Jay County's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Jay County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Jay County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Jay County, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Jay County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Jay County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Jay County average
How we know this about Jay County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Jay County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Jay County
When does frost risk typically end in Jay County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Jay County typically lands around Apr 10, 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 1.
How long is the growing season in Jay County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Jay County sees about 200 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 13, about 165 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Jay County?
The federal record around Jay County is a meaningful one — 136 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (85), the nearest Toxics Release Inventory record about 0.2 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.
Everything above is measured at Jay County's scale — its 6a band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Jay County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Indiana's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Jay County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Jay County's own scale — its own ~200-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 136 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Jay County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Jay County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Jay CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 136 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Toxics Release Inventory record about 0.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Jay County's boundary and the 245,699 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Jay County sitting wholly inside the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Jay County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Indiana grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Indiana
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Jay County — the ~200 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Jay County's 245,699 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 136 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Jay Countyread your own land →