Marblehead, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
You’re in North Shore
The settled coast north of Boston — salt air, tidy town lots, and sea-tempered winters that hold the cold off a little longer than the hills inland. Wind and salt spray are the near-shore gardener's companions here.
Even in Marblehead, 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 Marblehead 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 Marblehead — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Marblehead — the short answer
Marblehead, Massachusetts: USDA zone 7a, about 234 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~234
- 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 7a is Marblehead's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Marblehead's 234-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Marblehead
Each reading below is measured for Marblehead itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMarblehead runs about 234 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
MeasuredMarblehead sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Marblehead is in
Marblehead sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Marblehead's own centroid rather than borrowed from Essex County.
What Grows in Marblehead
Every plant below cleared Marblehead's own zone 7a and its 234-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Marblehead?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 20 — 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 Marblehead
Spotted lanternfly documented 11 miles from Marblehead, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Marblehead
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Marblehead. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MARBLEHEAD MARINE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- MARBLEHEAD TRADING CO INCBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- MARBLEHEAD TRANSPORTATION COUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- BOSTON YACHT CLUBUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- BOSTON YACHT CLUBBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- MARBLEHEAD LIGHT DEPARTMENTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- MARBLEHEAD MUNICIPAL LIGHT-COMMERCIALBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- ABBOT HALLBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- MARBLEHEAD TEXACOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- MARBLEHEAD WATER DEPT. (MWRA)PFAS · 1.0 mi
- PHILLIPS & LEE GULF STATION INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- PHILLIPS AND LEE GULFBrownfields · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Marblehead'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 Marblehead.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Marblehead
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Marblehead
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Marblehead, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Marblehead — Brownfields (1,037 sites) and Superfund (26 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Marblehead
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 Marblehead average
Your land is one point inside Marblehead
Everything above resolves to Marblehead 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 Marblehead Average
Marblehead Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Marblehead
- ●One soil character for all of Marblehead
- ●Frost dates read at Marblehead's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Marblehead's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Marblehead
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Marblehead, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Marblehead averages can't show:
We read public map data around Marblehead — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Marblehead average
How we know this about Marblehead
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 Marblehead’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 Marblehead
When does frost risk typically end in Marblehead?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Marblehead typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
When is the first frost in Marblehead?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Marblehead typically arrives around Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 6, so the watching starts about Oct 21 — about 234 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Marblehead?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Marblehead sees about 234 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Nov 6, about 199 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Marblehead?
The federal record around Marblehead runs heavier than most — 1,620 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (1,037), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Marblehead?
From about Oct 21 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Marblehead's scale — its 7a band and its 234-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Marblehead'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 Marblehead’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Marblehead's own scale — its own ~234-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,803 acres it covers and 1,620 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Marblehead's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Marblehead's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 20 and the ~234-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,620 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Marblehead, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Marblehead's boundary and the 2,803 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~234-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Marblehead's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Marbleheadlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Marblehead's 2,803 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 Marblehead's 2,803 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Marblehead you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,803 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.8 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 Marblehead-wide figureread your own land →
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