Earl Park, 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, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Earl Park, 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 Earl Park 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 Earl Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Earl Park — the short answer
Earl Park, Indiana: USDA zone 5b, about 199 days between hard freezes, across 591 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~199
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 591 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 Earl Park's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Earl Park's 199-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Earl Park
Each reading below is measured for Earl Park itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredEarl Park runs about 199 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredEarl Park 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 Earl Park is in
Earl Park sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Earl Park's own centroid rather than borrowed from Benton County.
What Grows in Earl Park
Every plant below cleared Earl Park's own zone 5b and its 199-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Earl Park?
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 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 Oct 25 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
Documented around Earl Park
Survey cells within 31 miles of Earl Park checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 56 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Earl Park
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Earl Park. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- STRASBURGER TRUCKING INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- BENNETTS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- EARL PARK ELEVATOR DIVISIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- LARRYS SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- KENTLAND MUNICIPAL AIRPORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.2 mi
- Sphalerite and Galena Occurence Z84Mining · 5.4 mi
- VESTASBrownfields · 5.4 mi
- ROGERS GROUP NEWTON COUNTY STONEUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- CPX INCBrownfields · 5.7 mi
- WATT TRUCKING INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- FUNK & SONS INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
- LIQUID DRY MIX TERMINALUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Earl Park'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 Earl Park.
Total Sites
85
within ~10 miles of Earl Park
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
6 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Earl Park
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Earl Park
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Earl Park, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Earl Park — Underground Storage Tanks (63 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (6 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Earl Park
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 Earl Park average
Your land is one point inside Earl Park
Everything above resolves to Earl Park as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 591 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 Earl Park Average
Earl Park Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Earl Park
- ●One soil character for all of Earl Park
- ●Frost dates read at Earl Park's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Earl Park's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Earl Park
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Earl Park, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Earl Park averages can't show:
We read public map data around Earl Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Earl Park average
How we know this about Earl Park
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 Earl Park’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 Earl Park
When does frost risk typically end in Earl Park?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Earl Park 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 Earl Park?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Earl Park typically arrives around Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 11, so the watching starts about Sep 25 — about 199 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Earl Park?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Earl Park sees about 199 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 11, about 164 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Earl Park?
The federal record around Earl Park shows 85 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (63), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Earl Park?
From about Sep 25 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 Oct 25 (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 Oct 25. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Earl Park's scale — its 5b band and its 199-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Earl Park'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 Earl Park’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Earl Park's own scale — its own ~199-day season between 28°F freezes, the 591 acres it covers and 85 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Earl Park's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Earl Park's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 25 and the ~199-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 85 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Earl Park, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Earl Park's boundary and the 591 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~199-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Earl Park's own centroid, the Central Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Earl Park 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 Earl Park's 591 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Benton County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Benton 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 Benton County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Earl Park's 591 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Earl Park you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 591 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 Earl Park-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaEarl Park sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.