Huron County, in Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Huron County lies within the Michigan Thumb — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Huron County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Huron County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Huron County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Huron County — the short answer
Huron County, Michigan: USDA zone 6a, about 189 days between hard freezes, across 535K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~189
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 535K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 Huron County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Huron County's 189-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Huron County
Across a year, Huron County accumulates about 2,135 growing degree days above 50°F, about 35 more than the middle Michigan county — ahead of 44 of Michigan’s 83 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Huron County
Across Huron County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Shebeon, Kilmanagh, and Tappan are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally somewhat poorly drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.8–7.6, neutral. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Somewhat poorly drained
Prime farmland
4%
Hydric soils
38%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Huron County
The USDA soil survey maps 47% of Huron County as somewhat poorly drained — but another 50% drains differently: 32% poorly drained, 11% moderately well drained.
Shebeon is the most extensive named soil at 26% of mapped acres, then Kilmanagh (20%) and Tappan (4%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Huron County
Each reading below is measured for Huron County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Huron County are somewhat poorly drained, in hydrologic group B/D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Huron County runs about pH 6.8–7.6, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredHuron County runs about 189 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
MeasuredHuron County 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 Huron County is in
Huron County sits in the Huron/Erie Lake Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Huron County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Huron County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 189-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile.
Is it too late to plant in Huron County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 26; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 23 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 29 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Even past midsummer there is room for a true fall garden here, and garlic planted near the close carries the momentum into next year.
Documented around Huron County
- Japanese beetle3 documented records
- monarch butterfly35 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Huron County
USGS estimates 291,999 lb of Glyphosate on Huron County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (69,162 lb) and Metolachlor-s (62,439 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Huron County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Huron County — 402 documented sites across 5 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
There's a meaningful federal record across Huron County — worth a look before you plant food, not a reason to hold back from growing. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. A soil test before new food beds is the sensible precaution here, and the map shows exactly which sites sit where, so you can see what's actually near you.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Huron County
Closest first, across Huron County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 17N 14E 15BAAA 01 HURON CO (BLOOMFIELD TWP, H-23)Nitrate · 2.2 mi
- Louisville GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Badgley ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
- 18N 14E 29DCCC01 HURON CO (HURON TWP, H-28)Nitrate · 3.5 mi
- Ludington AviationUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- PORT HOPE-GORE-RUBICON U. A.PFAS · 4.6 mi
- 18N 13E 26CAAD01 HURON CO (DWIGHT TWP, H-27)Nitrate · 4.6 mi
- 17N 15E 18DDDD01 HURON CO (RUBICON TWP, H-24)Nitrate · 5.6 mi
- 17N 13E 28CBCC01 HURON CO (LINCOLN TWP, H-22)Nitrate · 5.9 mi
- Maurer Grain Marketing LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.5 mi
- Herbert RoggenbuckUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.5 mi
- 16N 14E 21AADC01 HURON CO (SIGEL TWP, H-17)Nitrate · 6.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Huron County'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 Huron County.
Total Sites
402
across Huron County
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Huron County
Severity Distribution
across Huron County
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Huron County
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 Huron County average
Your land is one point inside Huron County
Everything above resolves to Huron County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 535K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Huron County Average
Huron County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Huron County
- ●One soil character for all of Huron County
- ●Frost dates read at Huron County's scale: Apr 23 to Oct 29
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Huron County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Huron County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Huron County, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Huron County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Huron County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Huron County average
How we know this about Huron County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Huron County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Huron County
When does frost risk typically end in Huron County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Huron County typically lands around Apr 23, 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 14.
How long is the growing season in Huron County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Huron County sees about 189 frost-free days — roughly Apr 23 through Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 14 to Oct 15, about 154 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Huron County?
The federal record around Huron County is a meaningful one — 402 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (216), the nearest Nitrate record about 2.2 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.
Everything above is measured at Huron County's scale — its 6a band and its 189-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Huron County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Michigan's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Huron County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Huron County's own scale — its own ~189-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 402 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Huron County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Huron County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~189-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Huron CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 402 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Nitrate record about 2.2 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Huron County's boundary and the 534,987 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~189-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Huron County sitting wholly inside the Huron/Erie Lake PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Huron County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Huron County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Michigan grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Michigan
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Huron County — the ~189 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Huron County's 534,987 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 402 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Huron Countyread your own land →