North Vernon, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — 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 North Vernon, 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 North Vernon 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 North Vernon — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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North Vernon — the short answer
North Vernon, Indiana: USDA zone 6b, about 214 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~214
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 5K 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 North Vernon's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against North Vernon's 214-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in North Vernon
Each reading below is measured for North Vernon itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNorth Vernon 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
MeasuredNorth Vernon 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 North Vernon is in
North Vernon sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at North Vernon's own centroid rather than borrowed from Jennings County.
What Grows in North Vernon
Every plant below cleared North Vernon'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 North Vernon?
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 7; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 4 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around North Vernon
Survey cells within 31 miles of North Vernon checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 39 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near North Vernon
Closest first, within ~10 miles of North Vernon. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SET ENTERPRISES INCBrownfields · 750 ft
- SET ENTERPRISES INCToxics Release Inventory · 750 ft
- HILEX POLY CO LLCToxics Release Inventory · 1000 ft
- HILEX POLY CO LLCBrownfields · 1000 ft
- Hilex Poly Company LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- Atmosphere Annealing LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- MARTINREA NORTH VERNON PLTBrownfields · 1500 ft
- MARTINREA NORTH VERNON PLTToxics Release Inventory · 1500 ft
- Circle K 68Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Sunoco Food MartUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- GREASE PITUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- NORTH VERNON WATER DEPARTMENTPFAS · 2400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from North Vernon'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 North Vernon.
Total Sites
98
within ~10 miles of North Vernon
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of North Vernon
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of North Vernon
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around North Vernon, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 13 sites within ~10 miles of North Vernon. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in North Vernon
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 North Vernon average
Your land is one point inside North Vernon
Everything above resolves to North Vernon as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 5K 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 city 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 North Vernon Average
North Vernon Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across North Vernon
- ●One soil character for all of North Vernon
- ●Frost dates read at North Vernon's scale: Apr 4 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not North Vernon's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in North Vernon
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in North Vernon, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that North Vernon averages can't show:
We read public map data around North Vernon — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the North Vernon average
How we know this about North Vernon
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at North Vernon’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 North Vernon
When does frost risk typically end in North Vernon?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in North Vernon typically lands around Apr 4, 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 25.
When is the first frost in North Vernon?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in North Vernon typically arrives around Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 21, so the watching starts about Oct 5 — about 214 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in North Vernon?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, North Vernon sees about 214 frost-free days — roughly Apr 4 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 25 to Oct 21, about 179 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in North Vernon?
The federal record around North Vernon shows 98 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (44), the nearest Brownfields 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 North Vernon?
From about Oct 5 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 4 (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 4. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at North Vernon's scale — its 6b band and its 214-day season. Your yard writes its own version of North Vernon'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 North Vernon’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at North Vernon's own scale — its own ~214-day season between 28°F freezes, the 4,911 acres it covers and 98 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- North Vernon's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- North Vernon's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 4 and Nov 4 and the ~214-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 98 documented contamination sites on the federal record near North Vernon, the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- North Vernon's boundary and the 4,911 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~214-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at North Vernon's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around North Vernon 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 North Vernon's 4,911 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Jennings County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Jennings 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 Jennings County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among North Vernon's 4,911 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of North Vernon you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 4,911 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 North Vernon-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaNorth Vernon sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides