Bath, Maine, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
The conditions favor cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Bath, 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 Bath 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 Bath — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Bath — the short answer
Bath, Maine: USDA zone 5b, about 186 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~186
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 6K 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 5b is Bath's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bath's 186-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bath
Each reading below is measured for Bath itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBath runs about 186 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBath sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Bath is in
Bath sits in the Acadian Plains and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bath's own centroid rather than borrowed from Sagadahoc County.
What Grows in Bath
Every plant below cleared Bath's own zone 5b and its 186-day season. Each card opens that plant's Maine profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bath?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 23; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 23 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Bath
Survey cells within 31 miles of Bath checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 50 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Bath
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bath. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WEST BATH MARKETUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- PUBLIC WORKS DEPTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- WEST BATH DISTRICT COURTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- BISSON MOVING & STORAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- J J NISSEN BAKING COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- MORSE HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- THE KENNEBEC COMPANYBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- PUFFIN STOP BATHUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- SMARTS BODY SHOP INCBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- U.S. NAVY SUPERVISOR OF SHIPBUILDINGBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- BATH IRON WORKSBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- WASHINGTON AT PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bath'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 Bath.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bath
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bath
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bath, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Bath — Superfund (7 sites) and Mining (19 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Bath
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 Bath average
Your land is one point inside Bath
Everything above resolves to Bath as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 6K 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 Bath Average
Bath Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Bath
- ●One soil character for all of Bath
- ●Frost dates read at Bath's scale: Apr 20 to Oct 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bath's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bath
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bath, Maine — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bath averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bath — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bath average
How we know this about Bath
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 Bath’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 Bath
When does frost risk typically end in Bath?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bath typically lands around Apr 20, 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 11.
When is the first frost in Bath?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bath typically arrives around Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 9, so the watching starts about Sep 23 — about 186 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bath?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bath sees about 186 frost-free days — roughly Apr 20 through Oct 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 11 to Oct 9, about 151 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bath?
The federal record around Bath is a meaningful one — 323 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (168), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Bath?
From about Sep 23 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 23 (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 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bath's scale — its 5b band and its 186-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bath'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 Bath’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Bath's own scale — its own ~186-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,837 acres it covers and 323 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bath's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bath's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 20 and Oct 23 and the ~186-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 323 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bath, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bath's boundary and the 5,837 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~186-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bath's own centroid, the Acadian Plains and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Bath 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 Bath's 5,837 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Sagadahoc County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Sagadahoc County
- The growing challenges every Maine grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Maine
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Sagadahoc County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bath's 5,837 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bath you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,837 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Bath-wide figureread your own land →