Madaket, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
On paper, cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
You’re in Cape Cod & the Islands
A sandy, sea-wrapped peninsula and islands with the state's warmest, longest season — and its most maritime one. Acidic soils long worked for cranberries and beach plums; wind and salt are the constant neighbors of every garden.
Even in Madaket, 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 Madaket 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 Madaket — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Madaket — the short answer
Madaket, Massachusetts: USDA zone 7b, about 246 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~246
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 7b is Madaket's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Madaket's 246-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Madaket
Each reading below is measured for Madaket itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMadaket runs about 246 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
MeasuredMadaket sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Madaket is in
Madaket sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Madaket's own centroid rather than borrowed from Nantucket County.
What Grows in Madaket
Every plant below cleared Madaket's own zone 7b and its 246-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Madaket?
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 Feb 26; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 26 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 27 — 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 Madaket
Spotted lanternfly documented 4 miles from Madaket, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Madaket
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Madaket. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MADAKET MARINEBrownfields · 2200 ft
- WASTE OPTIONS NANTUCKET LLCBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- MA-NBW 110Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- VERIZON NEW ENGLAND INCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- NANTUCKET DEPT OF PUBLIC WORKSBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- MA-NBW 200Nitrate · 2.0 mi
- ISLAND RESTORATIONBrownfields · 2.2 mi
- MA-NBW 148Nitrate · 2.9 mi
- OFFSHORE ANIMAL HOSPITALBrownfields · 3.2 mi
- ALBERT GLOWACKI LANDSCAPE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- LAND BANK WORKSHOPBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- MARLANDS AUTO REPAIR INCBrownfields · 3.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Madaket'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 Madaket.
Total Sites
91
within ~10 miles of Madaket
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Madaket
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Madaket
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Madaket, Brownfields runs higher than the national average — 46 sites within ~10 miles of Madaket. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Madaket
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 Madaket average
Your land is one point inside Madaket
Everything above resolves to Madaket as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Madaket Average
Madaket Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Madaket
- ●One soil character for all of Madaket
- ●Frost dates read at Madaket's scale: Mar 26 to Nov 27
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Madaket's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Madaket
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Madaket, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Madaket averages can't show:
We read public map data around Madaket — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Madaket average
How we know this about Madaket
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 Madaket’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 Madaket
When does frost risk typically end in Madaket?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Madaket typically lands around Mar 26, 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 16.
When is the first frost in Madaket?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Madaket typically arrives around Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 13, so the watching starts about Oct 28 — about 246 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Madaket?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Madaket sees about 246 frost-free days — roughly Mar 26 through Nov 27, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 16 to Nov 13, about 211 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Madaket?
The federal record around Madaket is a meaningful one — 91 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (46), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.4 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 Madaket?
From about Oct 28 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 27 (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 27. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Madaket's scale — its 7b band and its 246-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Madaket'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 Madaket’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Madaket's own scale — its own ~246-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,271 acres it covers and 91 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Madaket's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Madaket's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 26 and Nov 27 and the ~246-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 91 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Madaket, the closest Brownfields record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Madaket's boundary and the 1,271 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~246-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Madaket's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Madaketlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Madaket's 1,271 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Nantucket County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Nantucket 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 Nantucket County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Madaket's 1,271 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Madaket you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,271 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.4 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 Madaket-wide figureread your own land →
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