Mount Summit, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Mount Summit, 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 Mount Summit 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 Mount Summit — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Mount Summit — the short answer
Mount Summit, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 132 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 132 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 Mount Summit's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Mount Summit's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Mount Summit
Each reading below is measured for Mount Summit itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMount Summit 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
Winter hardiness
MeasuredMount Summit 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 Mount Summit is in
Mount Summit sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Mount Summit's own centroid rather than borrowed from Henry County.
What Grows in Mount Summit
Every plant below cleared Mount Summit's own zone 6a and its 200-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Mount Summit?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 Mount Summit
Survey cells within 31 miles of Mount Summit checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 62 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Mount Summit
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Mount Summit. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- KALIA SUMANUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- Marathon GasUnderground Storage Tanks · 550 ft
- MATTHEWS COLLISION REPAIRBrownfields · 550 ft
- KAIROS SPECIALTY METALS CORPORATIONBrownfields · 1000 ft
- SWITZER TANK LINES INCORPORATEDBrownfields · 1000 ft
- Kairos Specialty Metals CorporationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- INDOT NEW CASTLE TESTING LABBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- PRO GREEN INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Harvest Land Cooperative Incorporated Mount Summit Agriculture CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- JOES SALVAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- ROBERTS PIPELINE CONSTRUCTION INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- ROBERTS PIPELINE INCORPORATEDBrownfields · 2.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Mount Summit'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 Mount Summit.
Total Sites
206
within ~10 miles of Mount Summit
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
5 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Mount Summit
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Mount Summit
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Mount Summit, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Mount Summit — Superfund (5 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (132 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.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Mount Summit
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 Mount Summit average
Your land is one point inside Mount Summit
Everything above resolves to Mount Summit as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 132 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 Mount Summit Average
Mount Summit Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Mount Summit
- ●One soil character for all of Mount Summit
- ●Frost dates read at Mount Summit's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Mount Summit's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Mount Summit
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Mount Summit, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Mount Summit averages can't show:
We read public map data around Mount Summit — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Mount Summit average
How we know this about Mount Summit
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 Mount Summit’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 Mount Summit
When does frost risk typically end in Mount Summit?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Mount Summit 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.
When is the first frost in Mount Summit?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Mount Summit typically arrives around Oct 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 13, so the watching starts about Sep 27 — about 200 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Mount Summit?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Mount Summit 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 Mount Summit?
The federal record around Mount Summit is a meaningful one — 206 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (132), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Mount Summit?
From about Sep 27 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 27 (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 27. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Mount Summit's scale — its 6a band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Mount Summit'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 Mount Summit’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Mount Summit's own scale — its own ~200-day season between 28°F freezes, the 132 acres it covers and 206 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Mount Summit's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Mount Summit's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Oct 27 and the ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 206 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Mount Summit, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Mount Summit's boundary and the 132 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Mount Summit's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Mount Summit 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 Mount Summit's 132 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Henry County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Henry 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 Henry County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Mount Summit's 132 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Mount Summit you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 132 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Mount Summit-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaMount Summit sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides