Fairland, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Fairland, 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 Fairland 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 Fairland — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Fairland — the short answer
Fairland, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 214 days between hard freezes, across 731 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- 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
- ~214
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 731 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 Fairland's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Fairland's 214-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Fairland
Each reading below is measured for Fairland itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredFairland runs about 214 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
MeasuredFairland 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 Fairland is in
Fairland sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Fairland's own centroid rather than borrowed from Shelby County.
What Grows in Fairland
Every plant below cleared Fairland's own zone 6a and its 214-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Fairland?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (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. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Fairland
Survey cells within 31 miles of Fairland checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 70 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Fairland
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Fairland. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- STATIC PROBrownfields · 350 ft
- FAIRLAND SERVICE CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- OFFROAD SPECTACULAR INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 550 ft
- JUPITER COIL COATING DIVISIONToxics Release Inventory · 850 ft
- JUPITER COIL COATING DIVISIONBrownfields · 850 ft
- RING CARRIERS INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- Frodies PlaceUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- FAIRLAND OIL COMPANY INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- US BATH GROUP LLC DBA MPL COMPANYToxics Release Inventory · 2100 ft
- US BATH GROUP LLC DBA MPL COMPANYBrownfields · 2100 ft
- NORTHWESTERN CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- Rumpke of Indiana IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Fairland'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 Fairland.
Total Sites
251
within ~10 miles of Fairland
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
4 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Fairland
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Fairland
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Fairland, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Fairland — Toxics Release Inventory (35 sites) and Superfund (4 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Fairland
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 Fairland average
Your land is one point inside Fairland
Everything above resolves to Fairland as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 731 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 Fairland Average
Fairland Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Fairland
- ●One soil character for all of Fairland
- ●Frost dates read at Fairland's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Fairland's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Fairland
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Fairland, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Fairland averages can't show:
We read public map data around Fairland — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Fairland average
How we know this about Fairland
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 Fairland’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 Fairland
When does frost risk typically end in Fairland?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Fairland typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Fairland?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Fairland 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 214 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Fairland?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Fairland sees about 214 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 20, about 179 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Fairland?
The federal record around Fairland is a meaningful one — 251 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (121), the nearest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile 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 Fairland?
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 Fairland's scale — its 6a band and its 214-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Fairland'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 Fairland’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Fairland's own scale — its own ~214-day season between 28°F freezes, the 731 acres it covers and 251 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Fairland's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Fairland's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 3 and the ~214-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 251 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Fairland, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Fairland's boundary and the 731 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~214-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Fairland's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Fairland 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 Fairland's 731 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Shelby County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Shelby 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 Shelby County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Fairland's 731 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Fairland you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 731 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile 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 Fairland-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaFairland sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides