New Trenton, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in New Trenton, 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 New Trenton 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 New Trenton — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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New Trenton — the short answer
New Trenton, Indiana: USDA zone 6b, about 214 days between hard freezes, across 292 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~214
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 292 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 6b is New Trenton's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against New Trenton's 214-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in New Trenton
Each reading below is measured for New Trenton itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNew Trenton 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
MeasuredNew Trenton sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 New Trenton is in
New Trenton sits in the Interior Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at New Trenton's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Franklin County is mostly Eastern Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in New Trenton
Every plant below cleared New Trenton's own zone 6b and its 214-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in New Trenton?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 2 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around New Trenton
Spotted lanternfly documented 18 miles from New Trenton, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near New Trenton
Closest first, within ~10 miles of New Trenton. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Milestone Contractors LPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- INDOT BRIDGE 46 15 1987ABrownfields · 1.5 mi
- TRI-TOWNSHIP WATER CORPORATIONPFAS · 1.9 mi
- SOUTHWEST REGIONAL WATER DISTRICTPFAS · 1.9 mi
- NORTH DEARBORN WATER CORPORATIONPFAS · 1.9 mi
- HARRISON CITY PWSPFAS · 1.9 mi
- HUFF CONTRACTORS INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- T & T EXPEDITERS INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- WHITEWATER BAIT SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.8 mi
- Easy Stop Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- ONE STOP EXPRESSUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
- BEEBE MARATHONUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from New Trenton'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 New Trenton.
Total Sites
156
within ~10 miles of New Trenton
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of New Trenton
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of New Trenton
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around New Trenton, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of New Trenton — PFAS (5 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (10 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in New Trenton
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 New Trenton average
Your land is one point inside New Trenton
Everything above resolves to New Trenton as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 292 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 New Trenton Average
New Trenton Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across New Trenton
- ●One soil character for all of New Trenton
- ●Frost dates read at New Trenton's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 2
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not New Trenton's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in New Trenton
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in New Trenton, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that New Trenton averages can't show:
We read public map data around New Trenton — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the New Trenton average
How we know this about New Trenton
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 New Trenton’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 New Trenton
When does frost risk typically end in New Trenton?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in New Trenton typically lands around Apr 2, 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 23.
When is the first frost in New Trenton?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in New Trenton typically arrives around Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 19, so the watching starts about Oct 3 — about 214 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in New Trenton?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, New Trenton sees about 214 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 2, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 19, about 179 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in New Trenton?
The federal record around New Trenton is a meaningful one — 156 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (92), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles 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 New Trenton?
From about Oct 3 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 2 (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 2. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at New Trenton's scale — its 6b band and its 214-day season. Your yard writes its own version of New Trenton'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 New Trenton’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at New Trenton's own scale — its own ~214-day season between 28°F freezes, the 292 acres it covers and 156 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- New Trenton's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- New Trenton's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 2 and the ~214-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 156 documented contamination sites on the federal record near New Trenton, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- New Trenton's boundary and the 292 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~214-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- New Trenton sits in the Interior Plateau — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of New Trentonlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so New Trenton's 292 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Franklin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Franklin 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 Franklin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among New Trenton's 292 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of New Trenton you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 292 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 New Trenton-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaNew Trenton sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides