LaPorte County, in Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
LaPorte County lies within the Northwest Indiana / Lake Michigan Shoreline (Michiana Fruit Belt) — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
LaPorte County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across LaPorte 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 LaPorte County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
LaPorte County — the short answer
LaPorte County, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 208 days between hard freezes, across 383K 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)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~208
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 383K 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 LaPorte County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against LaPorte County's 208-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in LaPorte County
Across a year, LaPorte County accumulates about 2,744 growing degree days above 50°F, about 412 fewer than the middle Indiana county — ahead of 5 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 LaPorte County
Across LaPorte County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Tracy, Gilford, and Elston are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.8–6.3, moderately acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group A/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
33%
Hydric soils
35%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across LaPorte County
The USDA soil survey maps 38% of LaPorte County as well drained — but another 59% drains differently: 18% poorly drained, 16% very poorly drained.
Tracy is the most extensive named soil at 18% of mapped acres, then Gilford (11%) and Elston (9%).
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 LaPorte County
Each reading below is measured for LaPorte 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 LaPorte County are well drained, in hydrologic group A/D — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across LaPorte County runs about pH 5.8–6.3, 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 35% of LaPorte 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
MeasuredLaPorte County runs about 208 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 LaPorte County is in
LaPorte County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains (78%) and Central Corn Belt Plains (22%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in LaPorte County
We scored all 1,086 plants against LaPorte County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 208-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 LaPorte County?
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 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 Nov 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around LaPorte County
Spotted lanternfly documented 17 miles from LaPorte County, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle1 documented records
- monarch butterfly5 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in LaPorte County
USGS estimates 214,863 lb of Glyphosate on LaPorte County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (119,683 lb) and Acetochlor (77,222 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 LaPorte County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across LaPorte County — 693 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 17 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
LaPorte County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near LaPorte County
Closest first, across LaPorte County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JOHN L SETSERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- LA PORTE MUNICIPAL AIRPORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- MINICH FARMSToxics Release Inventory · 2.1 mi
- BURDINE BODY SHOPBrownfields · 2.2 mi
- B & E MINI MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- E PAK MACHINERY INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- BANG UPSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- Family ExpressUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- LA PORTE CONSTRUCTION COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- NATIONAL VISTA PROD CO PACKAGING DIVToxics Release Inventory · 2.7 mi
- OLD US ARMY RESERVE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- FISHER CALO CHEMICALS & SOLVENTSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from LaPorte 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 LaPorte County.
Sources Checked
across LaPorte County
Severity Distribution
across LaPorte County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around LaPorte County, two things run higher than the national average across LaPorte County — Superfund (17 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (68 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in LaPorte 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 LaPorte County average
Your land is one point inside LaPorte County
Everything above resolves to LaPorte County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 383K 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 LaPorte County Average
LaPorte County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across LaPorte County
- ●One soil character for all of LaPorte County
- ●Frost dates read at LaPorte County's scale: Apr 10 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not LaPorte County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in LaPorte County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in LaPorte County, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that LaPorte County averages can't show:
We read public map data around LaPorte County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the LaPorte County average
How we know this about LaPorte 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 LaPorte County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about LaPorte County
When does frost risk typically end in LaPorte County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in LaPorte 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 LaPorte County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, LaPorte County sees about 208 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 21, about 173 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in LaPorte County?
The federal record around LaPorte County runs heavier than most — 693 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (390), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.3 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.
Everything above is measured at LaPorte County's scale — its 6a band and its 208-day season. Your yard writes its own version of LaPorte 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 LaPorte County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at LaPorte County's own scale — its own ~208-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 693 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- LaPorte County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- LaPorte County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~208-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in LaPorte CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 693 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.3 miles outFederal environmental registers
- LaPorte County's boundary and the 382,904 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~208-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions LaPorte County spans, Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in LaPorte County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto LaPorte 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 LaPorte County — the ~208 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 LaPorte County's 382,904 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 693 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 LaPorte Countyread your own land →