Pocasset, Massachusetts, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
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 Pocasset, 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 Pocasset 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 Pocasset — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Pocasset — the short answer
Pocasset, Massachusetts: USDA zone 7a, about 229 days between hard freezes, across 2K 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 15
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~229
- 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 7a is Pocasset's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pocasset's 229-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Pocasset
Each reading below is measured for Pocasset itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPocasset runs about 229 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
MeasuredPocasset 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 Pocasset is in
Pocasset sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Pocasset's own centroid rather than borrowed from Barnstable County.
What Grows in Pocasset
Every plant below cleared Pocasset's own zone 7a and its 229-day season. Each card opens that plant's Massachusetts profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Pocasset?
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 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 15 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Pocasset
Spotted lanternfly documented 14 miles from Pocasset, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Pocasset
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Pocasset. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SCALLOP BAY MARINA LLCBrownfields · 1.5 mi
- POCASSET SERVICE STATIONBrownfields · 1.6 mi
- POCASSET SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- BOURNE WATER DISTRICTPFAS · 1.7 mi
- A B MACNALLYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- KINGMAN YACHT CENTERBrownfields · 1.9 mi
- KINGMAN YACHT CENTER INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- MA-BHW 493-M01-11GNNitrate · 2.0 mi
- MA-BHW 493-0181Nitrate · 2.0 mi
- MA-BHW 493-M01-13BUNitrate · 2.0 mi
- MA-BHW 493-M01-05BKTNitrate · 2.0 mi
- MA-BHW 493-M01-03RTNitrate · 2.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pocasset'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 Pocasset.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Pocasset
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Pocasset
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pocasset, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 2,640 sites within ~10 miles of Pocasset. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Pocasset
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 Pocasset average
Your land is one point inside Pocasset
Everything above resolves to Pocasset 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 Pocasset Average
Pocasset Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Pocasset
- ●One soil character for all of Pocasset
- ●Frost dates read at Pocasset's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 15
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pocasset's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Pocasset
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pocasset, Massachusetts — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pocasset averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pocasset — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pocasset average
How we know this about Pocasset
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 Pocasset’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 Pocasset
When does frost risk typically end in Pocasset?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pocasset 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 Pocasset?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Pocasset typically arrives around Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 1, so the watching starts about Oct 16 — about 229 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Pocasset?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pocasset sees about 229 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 15, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Nov 1, about 194 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pocasset?
The federal record around Pocasset is a meaningful one — 3,337 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (2,640), the nearest Brownfields record about 1.5 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 Pocasset?
From about Oct 16 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 15 (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 15. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Pocasset's scale — its 7a band and its 229-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pocasset'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 Pocasset’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Pocasset's own scale — its own ~229-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,366 acres it covers and 3,337 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pocasset's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pocasset's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 15 and the ~229-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 3,337 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Pocasset, the closest Brownfields record about 1.5 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Pocasset's boundary and the 2,366 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~229-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Pocasset's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Pocassetlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Pocasset's 2,366 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Barnstable County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Barnstable 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 Barnstable County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Pocasset's 2,366 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Pocasset you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,366 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 1.5 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 Pocasset-wide figureread your own land →