Adams, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, cranberry, lavender, 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 The Berkshires
Western Massachusetts' cool, hilly uplands — rocky glacial soils, cold winters, and the state's shortest season. Apples, maples, and cold-hardy market gardens are the crops that have always made sense on this high ground.
Even in Adams, 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 Adams 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 Adams — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Adams — the short answer
Adams, Massachusetts: USDA zone 5b, about 172 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~172
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 Adams's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Adams's 172-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Adams
Each reading below is measured for Adams itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredAdams runs about 172 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
MeasuredAdams 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 Adams is in
Adams sits in the Northeastern Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northern Forests. That is read at Adams's own centroid rather than borrowed from Berkshire County.
What Grows in Adams
Every plant below cleared Adams's own zone 5b and its 172-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Adams?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 31; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 28 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 17 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
Documented around Adams
Survey cells within 31 miles of Adams checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 33 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Adams
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Adams. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ADAMS MGPBrownfields · 800 ft
- BERKSHIRE FUEL INCBrownfields · 900 ft
- BERKSHIRE FUEL INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- WALGREENS 19038Brownfields · 950 ft
- RACING MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- VS CAR WASHBrownfields · 1200 ft
- INDUSTRIAL WASTEWATER PUMP STUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- KRUTIAK D CONSTRUCTION INCBrownfields · 1500 ft
- ADAMS FIRE DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- ADAMS SPECIALTY AND PRINTINGBrownfields · 1800 ft
- VERIZON MASSACHUSETTS #841106Underground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- ST STANISLAUS RECTORYBrownfields · 1900 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Adams'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 Adams.
Total Sites
358
within ~10 miles of Adams
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
9 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Adams
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Adams
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Adams, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Adams — Superfund (9 sites) and PFAS (3 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.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Adams
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 Adams average
Your land is one point inside Adams
Everything above resolves to Adams as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 Adams Average
Adams Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Adams
- ●One soil character for all of Adams
- ●Frost dates read at Adams's scale: Apr 28 to Oct 17
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Adams's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Adams
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Adams, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Adams averages can't show:
We read public map data around Adams — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Adams average
How we know this about Adams
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 Adams’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 Adams
When does frost risk typically end in Adams?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Adams typically lands around Apr 28, 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 19.
When is the first frost in Adams?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Adams typically arrives around Oct 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 3, so the watching starts about Sep 17 — about 172 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Adams?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Adams sees about 172 frost-free days — roughly Apr 28 through Oct 17, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 19 to Oct 3, about 137 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Adams?
The federal record around Adams is a meaningful one — 358 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (151), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.2 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 Adams?
From about Sep 17 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 17 (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 17. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Adams's scale — its 5b band and its 172-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Adams'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 Adams’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Adams's own scale — its own ~172-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,568 acres it covers and 358 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Adams's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Adams's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 28 and Oct 17 and the ~172-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 358 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Adams, the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Adams's boundary and the 1,568 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~172-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Adams's own centroid, the Northeastern HighlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Adams 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 Adams's 1,568 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Berkshire County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Berkshire 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 Berkshire County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Adams's 1,568 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Adams you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,568 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 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 Adams-wide figureread your own land →
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