Foxborough, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
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 Foxborough, 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 Foxborough 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 Foxborough — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Foxborough — the short answer
Foxborough, Massachusetts: USDA zone 6b, about 203 days between hard freezes, across 2K 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 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~203
- 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 6b is Foxborough's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Foxborough's 203-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Foxborough
Each reading below is measured for Foxborough itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredFoxborough runs about 203 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
MeasuredFoxborough 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 Foxborough is in
Foxborough sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Foxborough's own centroid rather than borrowed from Norfolk County.
What Grows in Foxborough
Every plant below cleared Foxborough's own zone 6b and its 203-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Foxborough?
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 30 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Foxborough
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Foxborough, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Foxborough
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Foxborough. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- VERIZON MASSACHUSETTS #567106Underground Storage Tanks · 200 ft
- CONGDON PONTIAC-OLDS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- COMEYS CLEANERSBrownfields · 400 ft
- CONGDON PONTIAC OLDS INCBrownfields · 400 ft
- CVS PHARMACY 1868Brownfields · 450 ft
- O'REILLY AUTO PARTS 5814Brownfields · 450 ft
- FOXBORO DEPT OF FIRE/RESCUEUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- CUMBERLAND FARMS 2101Brownfields · 800 ft
- CUMBERLAND FARMS #2101Underground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- MA0029Underground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- FOXBORO WATER DEPARTMENTPFAS · 1200 ft
- PETE'S CITGO SERVICE & TIREUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Foxborough'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 Foxborough.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Foxborough
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Foxborough
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Foxborough, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Foxborough — Superfund (35 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (167 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.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Foxborough
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 Foxborough average
Your land is one point inside Foxborough
Everything above resolves to Foxborough 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 Foxborough Average
Foxborough Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Foxborough
- ●One soil character for all of Foxborough
- ●Frost dates read at Foxborough's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 30
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Foxborough's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Foxborough
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Foxborough, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Foxborough averages can't show:
We read public map data around Foxborough — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Foxborough average
How we know this about Foxborough
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 Foxborough’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 Foxborough
When does frost risk typically end in Foxborough?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Foxborough 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 Foxborough?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Foxborough typically arrives around Oct 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 16, so the watching starts about Sep 30 — about 203 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Foxborough?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Foxborough sees about 203 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 16, about 168 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Foxborough?
The federal record around Foxborough runs heavier than most — 2,138 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (1,293), 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 Foxborough?
From about Sep 30 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 30 (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 30. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Foxborough's scale — its 6b band and its 203-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Foxborough'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 Foxborough’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Foxborough's own scale — its own ~203-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,842 acres it covers and 2,138 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Foxborough's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Foxborough's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Oct 30 and the ~203-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,138 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Foxborough, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Foxborough's boundary and the 1,842 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~203-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Foxborough's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Foxboroughlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Foxborough's 1,842 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 Foxborough's 1,842 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Foxborough you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,842 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 Foxborough-wide figureread your own land →
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