Middleborough Center, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
You’re in South Shore
The coastal band south of Boston into old cranberry country — sandy, acidic ground and a maritime season that runs a touch longer than the interior. Bog and shoreline shape what has always grown well down here.
Even in Middleborough Center, 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 Middleborough Center 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 Middleborough Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Middleborough Center — the short answer
Middleborough Center, Massachusetts: USDA zone 6b, about 202 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 11
- 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
- ~202
- 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 Middleborough Center's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Middleborough Center's 202-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Middleborough Center
Each reading below is measured for Middleborough Center itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredMiddleborough Center runs about 202 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
MeasuredMiddleborough Center 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 Middleborough Center is in
Middleborough Center sits in the Northeastern Coastal Zone — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Middleborough Center's own centroid rather than borrowed from Plymouth County.
What Grows in Middleborough Center
Every plant below cleared Middleborough Center's own zone 6b and its 202-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Middleborough Center?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 14; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 11 (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. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Middleborough Center
Spotted lanternfly documented 14 miles from Middleborough Center, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Middleborough Center
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Middleborough Center. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- J & J CARE CARE CENTER INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- LANE STREET REALTY TRUSTBrownfields · 1300 ft
- MIDDLEBOROUGH GAS & ELECTRICBrownfields · 1400 ft
- LOUIS M GERSON CO INCBrownfields · 1600 ft
- LOUIS M GERSON CO INCSuperfund · 1600 ft
- LOUIS M GERSON CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- NICHOLS TRUCKING CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- SILVA AUTO BODY INCBrownfields · 1800 ft
- MassDOT MAINTENANCE DEPOT FAC 102Underground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- UNITED SERVICE STATION / MIDDLEBORO PETROLEUMUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- STANDISH OILBrownfields · 1900 ft
- MIDDLEBORO PETROLEUMBrownfields · 2000 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Middleborough Center'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 Middleborough Center.
Total Sites
902
within ~10 miles of Middleborough Center
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
14 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Middleborough Center
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Middleborough Center
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Middleborough Center, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Middleborough Center — Superfund (14 sites) and Brownfields (520 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Brownfields: Brownfield sites are former commercial or industrial properties where legacy soil contamination (heavy metals, PAHs, petroleum compounds) may persist.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check EPA brownfield remediation status — many sites have completed cleanup with institutional controls.
Check your specific parcel in Middleborough Center
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 Middleborough Center average
Your land is one point inside Middleborough Center
Everything above resolves to Middleborough Center 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 Middleborough Center Average
Middleborough Center Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Middleborough Center
- ●One soil character for all of Middleborough Center
- ●Frost dates read at Middleborough Center's scale: Apr 11 to Oct 30
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Middleborough Center's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Middleborough Center
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Middleborough Center, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Middleborough Center averages can't show:
We read public map data around Middleborough Center — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Middleborough Center average
How we know this about Middleborough Center
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 Middleborough Center’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 Middleborough Center
When does frost risk typically end in Middleborough Center?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Middleborough Center typically lands around Apr 11, 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 2.
When is the first frost in Middleborough Center?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Middleborough Center 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 202 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Middleborough Center?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Middleborough Center sees about 202 frost-free days — roughly Apr 11 through Oct 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 2 to Oct 16, about 167 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Middleborough Center?
The federal record around Middleborough Center is a meaningful one — 902 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (520), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Middleborough Center?
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 Middleborough Center's scale — its 6b band and its 202-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Middleborough Center'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 Middleborough Center’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Middleborough Center's own scale — its own ~202-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,514 acres it covers and 902 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Middleborough Center's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Middleborough Center's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 11 and Oct 30 and the ~202-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 902 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Middleborough Center, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Middleborough Center's boundary and the 2,514 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~202-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Middleborough Center's own centroid, the Northeastern Coastal ZoneUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Middleborough Centerlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Middleborough Center's 2,514 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Plymouth County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Plymouth 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 Plymouth County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Middleborough Center's 2,514 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Middleborough Center you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,514 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Middleborough Center-wide figureread your own land →
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