Cutler, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Cutler, 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 Cutler 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 Cutler — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cutler — the short answer
Cutler, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 206 days between hard freezes, across 273 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~206
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 273 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 Cutler's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cutler's 206-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cutler
Each reading below is measured for Cutler itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCutler 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
MeasuredCutler 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 Cutler is in
Cutler sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cutler's own centroid rather than borrowed from Carroll County.
What Grows in Cutler
Every plant below cleared Cutler's own zone 6a and its 206-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cutler?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 1 — 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 Cutler
Spotted lanternfly documented 19 miles from Cutler, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cutler
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cutler. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ALLTEL INDIANA INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- SMITH CONSTRUCTION COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- VAUGHN E & RITA J GARRISONUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
- BURLINGTON RADIO TOWER AT & TUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Grocery Depot 52Underground Storage Tanks · 4.1 mi
- Zinn Kitchens IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- IN DOT Flora UnitUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- ZINN KITCHENS INCORPORATEDBrownfields · 4.3 mi
- C & C ENERGY INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- COLLISIONS UNLIMITEDBrownfields · 4.3 mi
- JACKSON LEE PEARSON INCBrownfields · 4.5 mi
- SUB STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cutler'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 Cutler.
Total Sites
58
within ~10 miles of Cutler
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cutler
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cutler
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cutler, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 50 sites within ~10 miles of Cutler. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Cutler
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 Cutler average
Your land is one point inside Cutler
Everything above resolves to Cutler as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 273 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 Cutler Average
Cutler Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Cutler
- ●One soil character for all of Cutler
- ●Frost dates read at Cutler's scale: Apr 9 to Nov 1
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cutler's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cutler
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cutler, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cutler averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cutler — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cutler average
How we know this about Cutler
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 Cutler’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 Cutler
When does frost risk typically end in Cutler?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cutler typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
When is the first frost in Cutler?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cutler typically arrives around Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 18, so the watching starts about Oct 2 — about 206 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cutler?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cutler sees about 206 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Nov 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 18, about 171 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cutler?
The federal record around Cutler shows 58 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (50), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Cutler?
From about Oct 2 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 1 (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 1. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cutler's scale — its 6a band and its 206-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cutler'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 Cutler’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cutler's own scale — its own ~206-day season between 28°F freezes, the 273 acres it covers and 58 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cutler's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cutler's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Nov 1 and the ~206-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 58 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cutler, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cutler's boundary and the 273 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~206-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Cutler's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Cutlerlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cutler's 273 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Carroll County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Carroll 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 Carroll County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cutler's 273 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cutler you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 273 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Cutler-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaCutler sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides