Haverhill, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Haverhill, 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 Haverhill 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 Haverhill — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Haverhill — the short answer
Haverhill, Massachusetts: USDA zone 6b, about 204 days between hard freezes, across 21K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~204
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 21K 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 Haverhill's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Haverhill's 204-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Haverhill
Each reading below is measured for Haverhill itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHaverhill runs about 204 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
MeasuredHaverhill 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 Haverhill is in
Haverhill sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Haverhill's own centroid rather than borrowed from Essex County.
What Grows in Haverhill
Every plant below cleared Haverhill's own zone 6b and its 204-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Haverhill?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 29 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Haverhill
Spotted lanternfly documented 9 miles from Haverhill, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Haverhill
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Haverhill. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- JOSEPHS GOURMET PASTA & SAUCESToxics Release Inventory · 250 ft
- JOSEPHS GOURMET PASTA/NESTLE PREPARED FOODSBrownfields · 400 ft
- HALE STREET SERVICES, LLCBrownfields · 450 ft
- PSC INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- MILSPEC FINISHINGBrownfields · 500 ft
- BROCO TERMINALS, LLCBrownfields · 600 ft
- CLIMATE DESIGN SYSTEMS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- HAVERHILL SALVAGESuperfund · 750 ft
- SPEEDLIFE MOTORSPORT LLCBrownfields · 750 ft
- BSS REALTY TRUSTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- PLASTIC DISTRIBUTORS AND FABRICATORS INCBrownfields · 1300 ft
- MERRIMACK VALLEY TIRE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Haverhill'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 Haverhill.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Haverhill
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Haverhill
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Haverhill, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Haverhill — Superfund (25 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (121 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 Haverhill
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 Haverhill average
Your land is one point inside Haverhill
Everything above resolves to Haverhill as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 21K 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 Haverhill Average
Haverhill Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Haverhill
- ●One soil character for all of Haverhill
- ●Frost dates read at Haverhill's scale: Apr 8 to Oct 29
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Haverhill's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Haverhill
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Haverhill, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Haverhill averages can't show:
We read public map data around Haverhill — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Haverhill average
How we know this about Haverhill
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 Haverhill’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 Haverhill
When does frost risk typically end in Haverhill?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Haverhill typically lands around Apr 8, 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 29.
When is the first frost in Haverhill?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Haverhill typically arrives around Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 15, so the watching starts about Sep 29 — about 204 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Haverhill?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Haverhill sees about 204 frost-free days — roughly Apr 8 through Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 29 to Oct 15, about 169 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Haverhill?
The federal record around Haverhill runs heavier than most — 1,706 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (903), the nearest Toxics Release Inventory 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 Haverhill?
From about Sep 29 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 29 (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 29. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Haverhill's scale — its 6b band and its 204-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Haverhill'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 Haverhill’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Haverhill's own scale — its own ~204-day season between 28°F freezes, the 21,143 acres it covers and 1,706 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Haverhill's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Haverhill's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 8 and Oct 29 and the ~204-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,706 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Haverhill, the closest Toxics Release Inventory record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Haverhill's boundary and the 21,143 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~204-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Haverhill's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Haverhilllydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Haverhill's 21,143 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Essex County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Essex 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 Essex County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Haverhill's 21,143 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Haverhill you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 21,143 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Toxics Release Inventory 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 Haverhill-wide figureread your own land →
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