Pottawattamie Park, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, blueberry, lavender, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Pottawattamie Park — the short answer
Pottawattamie Park, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 225 days between hard freezes, across 162 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- 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 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~225
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 162 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 Pottawattamie Park's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pottawattamie Park's 225-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Pottawattamie Park
Each reading below is measured for Pottawattamie Park itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPottawattamie Park runs about 225 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
MeasuredPottawattamie Park 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 Pottawattamie Park is in
Pottawattamie Park sits in the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Pottawattamie Park's own centroid rather than borrowed from LaPorte County.
What Grows in Pottawattamie Park
Every plant below cleared Pottawattamie Park's own zone 6a and its 225-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Pottawattamie Park?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. 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 15 — 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 Pottawattamie Park
Spotted lanternfly documented 12 miles from Pottawattamie Park, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Pottawattamie Park
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Pottawattamie Park. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- REXFORD RAND CORPORATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- MICHIGAN CITY PARKS & RECREATION MAINTENANCE BUILDINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- Illinois Tool Works Ramset Red HeadUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- ILLINOIS TOOL WORKS RAMSET/REDHEADToxics Release Inventory · 2500 ft
- INGERSOLL RANDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- WATER WORKS DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- CRITERION CATALYSTS & TECHNOLOGIES LPToxics Release Inventory · 0.5 mi
- CRITERION CATALYSTS & TECHNOLOGIES LPBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- USALCO MICHIGAN CITY PLANT, LLCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- POTTAWATTOMIE COUNTRY CLUBUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- NORTHERN INDIANA COMMUTER TRANSPORTATION DISTRICTBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- PHM BRANDS, LLCToxics Release Inventory · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie Park.
Total Sites
535
within ~10 miles of Pottawattamie Park
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
11 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Pottawattamie Park
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Pottawattamie Park
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pottawattamie Park, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Pottawattamie Park — Superfund (11 sites) and Nitrate (152 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie Park average
Your land is one point inside Pottawattamie Park
Everything above resolves to Pottawattamie Park as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 162 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 Pottawattamie Park Average
Pottawattamie Park Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Pottawattamie Park
- ●One soil character for all of Pottawattamie Park
- ●Frost dates read at Pottawattamie Park's scale: Apr 4 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pottawattamie Park's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Pottawattamie Park
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pottawattamie Park, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pottawattamie Park averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pottawattamie Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pottawattamie Park average
How we know this about Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie Park
When does frost risk typically end in Pottawattamie Park?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pottawattamie Park 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 Pottawattamie Park?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Pottawattamie Park typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 225 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Pottawattamie Park?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pottawattamie Park sees about 225 frost-free days — roughly Apr 4 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 25 to Nov 1, about 190 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pottawattamie Park?
The federal record around Pottawattamie Park is a meaningful one — 535 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (240), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Pottawattamie Park?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Pottawattamie Park's scale — its 6a band and its 225-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pottawattamie 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 Pottawattamie Park’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Pottawattamie Park's own scale — its own ~225-day season between 28°F freezes, the 162 acres it covers and 535 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pottawattamie Park's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pottawattamie Park's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 4 and Nov 15 and the ~225-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 535 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Pottawattamie Park, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Pottawattamie Park's boundary and the 162 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~225-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Pottawattamie Park's own centroid, the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Pottawattamie Parklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Pottawattamie Park's 162 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom LaPorte County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom LaPorte 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 LaPorte County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Pottawattamie Park's 162 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Pottawattamie 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 162 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Pottawattamie Park-wide figureread your own land →