Cement City, Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Cement City, 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 Cement City 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 Cement City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Cement City — the short answer
Cement City, Michigan: USDA zone 6a, about 190 days between hard freezes, across 570 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 18
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~190
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 570 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 6a is Cement City's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Cement City's 190-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Cement City
Each reading below is measured for Cement City itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCement City runs about 190 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredCement City sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Cement City is in
Cement City sits in the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Cement City's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Lenawee County is mostly Eastern Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Cement City
Every plant below cleared Cement City's own zone 6a and its 190-day season. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Cement City?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 21; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 18 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 25 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Cement City
Survey cells within 31 miles of Cement City checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 43 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Cement City
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Cement City. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Village Of Cement CityUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- Twin Oaks SalesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- Cement City Cement PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- Norman A. Miller Elementary Sch.Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- ROSS DESIGN AND ENGINEERING INCBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- Darby ConcreteUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- Barrick EnterprisesUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- 12 x 127 Fuel Stop (formally Toms Auto Truck Stop)Underground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- Cement City GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- Liberty General StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- COLUMBIA CENTRAL SCHOOLBrownfields · 2.7 mi
- Columbia School DistrictUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Cement City'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 Cement City.
Total Sites
196
within ~10 miles of Cement City
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Cement City
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Cement City
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Cement City, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 125 sites within ~10 miles of Cement City. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Cement City
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 Cement City average
Your land is one point inside Cement City
Everything above resolves to Cement City as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 570 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 Cement City Average
Cement City Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Cement City
- ●One soil character for all of Cement City
- ●Frost dates read at Cement City's scale: Apr 18 to Oct 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Cement City's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Cement City
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Cement City, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Cement City averages can't show:
We read public map data around Cement City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Cement City average
How we know this about Cement City
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 Cement City’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 Cement City
When does frost risk typically end in Cement City?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Cement City typically lands around Apr 18, 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 9.
When is the first frost in Cement City?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Cement City typically arrives around Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 11, so the watching starts about Sep 25 — about 190 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Cement City?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Cement City sees about 190 frost-free days — roughly Apr 18 through Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 9 to Oct 11, about 155 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Cement City?
The federal record around Cement City is a meaningful one — 196 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (125), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Cement City?
From about Sep 25 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 25 (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 25. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Cement City's scale — its 6a band and its 190-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Cement City'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 Cement City’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Cement City's own scale — its own ~190-day season between 28°F freezes, the 570 acres it covers and 196 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Cement City's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Cement City's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 18 and Oct 25 and the ~190-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 196 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Cement City, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Cement City's boundary and the 570 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~190-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Cement City sits in the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Cement City checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Cement City's 570 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lenawee County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lenawee County
- The growing challenges every Michigan grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Michigan
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Lenawee County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Cement City's 570 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Cement City you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 570 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Cement City-wide figureread your own land →
More in Michigan
Wider growing context
What grows across MichiganCement City sits outside our named growing regions, so Michigan as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides