Acushnet Center, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
You’re in Southeastern Massachusetts
The low coastal plain of the South Coast — mild, moist, and worked for market vegetables and small orchards for generations. One of the gentler corners of the Massachusetts growing map.
Even in Acushnet Center, 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 Acushnet Center 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 Acushnet Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Acushnet Center — the short answer
Acushnet Center, Massachusetts: USDA zone 7a, about 221 days between hard freezes, across 906 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~221
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 906 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 7a is Acushnet Center's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Acushnet Center's 221-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Acushnet Center
Each reading below is measured for Acushnet Center itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredAcushnet Center runs about 221 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
MeasuredAcushnet Center sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Acushnet Center is in
Acushnet Center sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Acushnet Center's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bristol County.
What Grows in Acushnet Center
Every plant below cleared Acushnet Center's own zone 7a and its 221-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Acushnet Center?
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 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 10 — 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 Acushnet Center
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from Acushnet Center, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Acushnet Center
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Acushnet Center. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SHELL SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- NEW ENGLAND FARMSBrownfields · 450 ft
- TOWN OF ACUSHNETUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- PARTING WAYS SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- COASTAL BUSUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- LAWRENCE READY MIXED CONCRETE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- SOJKAS OIL BURNER SERVICEBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- ACUSHNET TEXACO MA AUTO TUNE & AUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- CHRIS SMALL ENGINE REPAIR AND SERVICEBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- JIMS AUTO BODYBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- SHAWMUT AUTO BODY & GARAGEBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- NATES OIL BURNER SERVICE INCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Acushnet Center'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 Acushnet Center.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Acushnet Center
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Acushnet Center
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Acushnet Center, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Acushnet Center — Brownfields (566 sites) and PFAS (9 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Acushnet Center
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 Acushnet Center average
Your land is one point inside Acushnet Center
Everything above resolves to Acushnet Center as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 906 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 Acushnet Center Average
Acushnet Center Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Acushnet Center
- ●One soil character for all of Acushnet Center
- ●Frost dates read at Acushnet Center's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Acushnet Center's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Acushnet Center
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Acushnet Center, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Acushnet Center averages can't show:
We read public map data around Acushnet Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Acushnet Center average
How we know this about Acushnet Center
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 Acushnet Center’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 Acushnet Center
When does frost risk typically end in Acushnet Center?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Acushnet Center typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Acushnet Center?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Acushnet Center typically arrives around Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 27, so the watching starts about Oct 11 — about 221 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Acushnet Center?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Acushnet Center sees about 221 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 27, about 186 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Acushnet Center?
The federal record around Acushnet Center runs heavier than most — 984 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (566), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Acushnet Center?
From about Oct 11 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 10 (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 10. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Acushnet Center's scale — its 7a band and its 221-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Acushnet Center'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 Acushnet Center’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Acushnet Center's own scale — its own ~221-day season between 28°F freezes, the 906 acres it covers and 984 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Acushnet Center's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Acushnet Center's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 10 and the ~221-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 984 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Acushnet Center, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Acushnet Center's boundary and the 906 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~221-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Acushnet Center's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Acushnet Centerlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Acushnet Center's 906 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bristol County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bristol County
- The growing challenges every Massachusetts grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Massachusetts
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Bristol County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Acushnet Center's 906 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Acushnet Center you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 906 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 Acushnet Center-wide figureread your own land →