Lenawee County, in Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Lenawee County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Lenawee 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 Lenawee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lenawee County — the short answer
Lenawee County, Michigan: USDA zone 6a, about 189 days between hard freezes, across 480K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~189
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 480K 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 Lenawee County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lenawee County's 189-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Lenawee County
Across a year, Lenawee County accumulates about 2,555 growing degree days above 50°F, about 455 more than the middle Michigan county — ahead of 75 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 Lenawee County
Across Lenawee County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Ziegenfuss, Glynwood, and Blount are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally somewhat poorly drained with a loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.3–6.7, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Somewhat poorly drained
Prime farmland
24%
Hydric soils
39%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Lenawee County
The USDA soil survey maps 27% of Lenawee County as somewhat poorly drained — but another 71% drains differently: 22% poorly drained, 18% well drained.
Ziegenfuss is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Glynwood (9%) and Blount (9%).
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 Lenawee County
Each reading below is measured for Lenawee 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 Lenawee County are somewhat poorly drained, in hydrologic group C/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 Lenawee County runs about pH 6.3–6.7, 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
MeasuredLenawee 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
MeasuredLenawee 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 Lenawee County is in
Lenawee County spans 3 EPA Level III ecoregions — Eastern Corn Belt Plains (51%), Huron/Erie Lake Plains (38%) and Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains (11%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Lenawee County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Lenawee 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 Lenawee County?
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 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 19 (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. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around Lenawee County
Spotted lanternfly documented 25 miles from Lenawee County, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle1 documented records
- monarch butterfly31 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Lenawee County
USGS estimates 202,430 lb of Glyphosate on Lenawee County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (33,612 lb) and Atrazine (32,034 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 Lenawee County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Lenawee County — 634 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 7 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
There's a meaningful federal record across Lenawee 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 Lenawee County
Closest first, across Lenawee County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Lenaweee Medical Care FacilityUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- LVA ADRIAN BIOFUEL LLC - W2 FUELBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- NEXT DIESELToxics Release Inventory · 0.5 mi
- INERGY AUTOMOTIVE SYSTEMS INCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- SEDCO INCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Lenawee County LibraryUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- M-34 Quick Stop Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- DARMEL HOFF OIL LLCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- MERILLAT INDUSTRIES INCORPORATEDBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- MERILLAT INDUSTRIES INCORPORATEDToxics Release Inventory · 0.7 mi
- Masco Cabinetry (Merillat) Manufacturing FacilityUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- BELL FORD LINCOLNBrownfields · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lenawee 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 Lenawee County.
Sources Checked
across Lenawee County
Severity Distribution
across Lenawee County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lenawee County, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 39 sites across Lenawee County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Lenawee 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 Lenawee County average
Your land is one point inside Lenawee County
Everything above resolves to Lenawee County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 480K 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 Lenawee County Average
Lenawee County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Lenawee County
- ●One soil character for all of Lenawee County
- ●Frost dates read at Lenawee County's scale: Apr 19 to Oct 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lenawee County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Lenawee County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lenawee County, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lenawee County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lenawee County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lenawee County average
How we know this about Lenawee 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 Lenawee County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Lenawee County
When does frost risk typically end in Lenawee County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lenawee County typically lands around Apr 19, 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 10.
How long is the growing season in Lenawee County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lenawee County sees about 189 frost-free days — roughly Apr 19 through Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 10 to Oct 11, about 154 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lenawee County?
The federal record around Lenawee County is a meaningful one — 634 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (339), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Lenawee County's scale — its 6a band and its 189-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lenawee 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 Lenawee County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Lenawee County's own scale — its own ~189-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 634 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lenawee County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lenawee 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 Lenawee CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 634 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Lenawee County's boundary and the 479,778 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~189-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 3 ecoregions Lenawee County spans, Eastern Corn Belt Plains the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Lenawee County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Lenawee 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 Lenawee 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 Lenawee County's 479,778 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 634 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 Lenawee Countyread your own land →