Young America, 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.
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 Young America, 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 Young America 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 Young America — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Young America — the short answer
Young America, Indiana: USDA zone 6a, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 90 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 90 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 Young America's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Young America's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Young America
Each reading below is measured for Young America itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredYoung America runs about 205 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
MeasuredYoung America 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 Young America is in
Young America sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Young America's own centroid rather than borrowed from Cass County.
What Grows in Young America
Every plant below cleared Young America's own zone 6a and its 205-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Young America?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 31 — 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 Young America
Spotted lanternfly documented 11 miles from Young America, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Young America
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Young America. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Millers Corner StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- 3A ZNitrate · 0.6 mi
- FLORA CARROLL JR SR HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- CASS 3 (CS 3)Nitrate · 2.6 mi
- D4 USGS WELLNitrate · 3.0 mi
- GALVESTON WATER WORKSPFAS · 4.6 mi
- 8A M RNitrate · 5.6 mi
- 8B P RNitrate · 5.8 mi
- 29 MaraMartUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.5 mi
- UNION 76 MANNS 76 PIT STOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.5 mi
- Brim Concrete IncorporatedUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.4 mi
- JACQUES SEED COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 7.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Young America'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 Young America.
Total Sites
80
within ~10 miles of Young America
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Young America
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Young America
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Young America, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 53 sites within ~10 miles of Young America. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Young America
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 Young America average
Your land is one point inside Young America
Everything above resolves to Young America as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 90 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 Young America Average
Young America Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Young America
- ●One soil character for all of Young America
- ●Frost dates read at Young America's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 31
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Young America's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Young America
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Young America, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Young America averages can't show:
We read public map data around Young America — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Young America average
How we know this about Young America
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 Young America’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 Young America
When does frost risk typically end in Young America?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Young America typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
When is the first frost in Young America?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Young America typically arrives around Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 17, so the watching starts about Oct 1 — about 205 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Young America?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Young America sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 17, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Young America?
The federal record around Young America shows 80 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (53), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Young America?
From about Oct 1 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 31 (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 31. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Young America's scale — its 6a band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Young America'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 Young America’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Young America's own scale — its own ~205-day season between 28°F freezes, the 90 acres it covers and 80 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Young America's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Young America's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 31 and the ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 80 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Young America, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Young America's boundary and the 90 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Young America's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Young Americalydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Young America's 90 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Cass County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Cass 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 Cass County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Young America's 90 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Young America you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 90 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 Young America-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaYoung America sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides