Bellingham, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
You’re in Greater Boston
The state's dense urban core, where growing means raised beds, community plots, and back-lot kitchen gardens more than open field. A long, mild season for the region — but city soil is the thing to know before you dig.
Even in Bellingham, 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 Bellingham 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 Bellingham — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Bellingham — the short answer
Bellingham, Massachusetts: USDA zone 6b, about 199 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~199
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 3K 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 6b is Bellingham's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Bellingham's 199-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Bellingham
Each reading below is measured for Bellingham itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBellingham runs about 199 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
MeasuredBellingham sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Bellingham is in
Bellingham sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Bellingham's own centroid rather than borrowed from Norfolk County.
What Grows in Bellingham
Every plant below cleared Bellingham's own zone 6b and its 199-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Bellingham?
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 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around Bellingham
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from Bellingham, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Bellingham
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Bellingham. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- BELLINGHAM COGENERATION FACILITYToxics Release Inventory · 850 ft
- BELLINGHAM COGENERATION FACILITYBrownfields · 850 ft
- AGT M&R 00094 BELLINGHAMBrownfields · 900 ft
- VADNAIS LUMBER SUPPLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- GRAYCER SCREW PRODUCTS COBrownfields · 1400 ft
- AHLSTROM LANTOR LLCBrownfields · 1400 ft
- OREILLY AUTO PARTS 6857Brownfields · 2000 ft
- NOURIA 1173Brownfields · 2100 ft
- PMG #6432Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- JAETACK COUSINS REALTYBrownfields · 2100 ft
- BEST BUY DDC 726Brownfields · 2300 ft
- GREENSCAPE LAND DESIGN INCBrownfields · 2600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Bellingham'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 Bellingham.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Bellingham
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Bellingham
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Bellingham, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Bellingham — Superfund (29 sites) and PFAS (17 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around 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 Bellingham
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 Bellingham average
Your land is one point inside Bellingham
Everything above resolves to Bellingham as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 3K 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 Bellingham Average
Bellingham Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Bellingham
- ●One soil character for all of Bellingham
- ●Frost dates read at Bellingham's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Bellingham's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Bellingham
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Bellingham, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Bellingham averages can't show:
We read public map data around Bellingham — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Bellingham average
How we know this about Bellingham
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 Bellingham’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 Bellingham
When does frost risk typically end in Bellingham?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Bellingham typically lands around Apr 10, 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 1.
When is the first frost in Bellingham?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Bellingham typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 199 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Bellingham?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Bellingham sees about 199 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 12, about 164 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Bellingham?
The federal record around Bellingham runs heavier than most — 1,619 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (896), the nearest Toxics Release Inventory record about 0.2 miles 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 Bellingham?
From about Sep 26 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Bellingham's scale — its 6b band and its 199-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Bellingham'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 Bellingham’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Bellingham's own scale — its own ~199-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,451 acres it covers and 1,619 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Bellingham's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Bellingham's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Oct 26 and the ~199-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,619 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Bellingham, the closest Toxics Release Inventory record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Bellingham's boundary and the 3,451 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~199-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Bellingham's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Bellinghamlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Bellingham's 3,451 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Norfolk County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Norfolk 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 Norfolk County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Bellingham's 3,451 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Bellingham you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,451 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Toxics Release Inventory 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 Bellingham-wide figureread your own land →
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