Dearborn, Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Dearborn, 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 Dearborn 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 Dearborn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Dearborn — the short answer
Dearborn, Michigan: USDA zone 6b, about 203 days between hard freezes, across 16K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~203
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 16K 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 Dearborn's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Dearborn's 203-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Dearborn
Each reading below is measured for Dearborn itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredDearborn runs about 203 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
MeasuredDearborn 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 Dearborn is in
Dearborn sits in the Huron/Erie Lake Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Dearborn's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wayne County.
What Grows in Dearborn
Every plant below cleared Dearborn's own zone 6b and its 203-day season. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Dearborn?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 14 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 3 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Dearborn
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from Dearborn, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Dearborn
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Dearborn. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- United Airlines Reservation CtrUnderground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- MICHIGAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANYBrownfields · 650 ft
- Dearborn Fairborn CO (M66120)Underground Storage Tanks · 650 ft
- World Headquarters BuildingUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- FORD MOTOR WORLD HEADQUARTERSToxics Release Inventory · 1000 ft
- FORD MOTOR WORLD HEADQUARTERSBrownfields · 1000 ft
- ENTRIX INCBrownfields · 2100 ft
- Eward Village MichiganUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- HYATT REGENCYBrownfields · 2300 ft
- Police StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Sears-fairlane Town CenterUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- J.c. Penney Corp #1166-8Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Dearborn'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 Dearborn.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Dearborn
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Dearborn
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Dearborn, Superfund runs higher than the national average — 147 sites within ~10 miles of Dearborn. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Dearborn
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 Dearborn average
Your land is one point inside Dearborn
Everything above resolves to Dearborn as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 16K 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 city 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 Dearborn Average
Dearborn Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Dearborn
- ●One soil character for all of Dearborn
- ●Frost dates read at Dearborn's scale: Apr 14 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Dearborn's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Dearborn
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Dearborn, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Dearborn averages can't show:
We read public map data around Dearborn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Dearborn average
How we know this about Dearborn
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Dearborn’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Dearborn
When does frost risk typically end in Dearborn?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Dearborn typically lands around Apr 14, 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 5.
When is the first frost in Dearborn?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Dearborn typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 203 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Dearborn?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Dearborn sees about 203 frost-free days — roughly Apr 14 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 5 to Oct 20, about 168 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Dearborn?
The federal record around Dearborn is a meaningful one — 6,062 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (2,822), 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 Dearborn?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Dearborn's scale — its 6b band and its 203-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Dearborn'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 Dearborn’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Dearborn's own scale — its own ~203-day season between 28°F freezes, the 15,518 acres it covers and 6,062 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Dearborn's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Dearborn's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 14 and Nov 3 and the ~203-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 6,062 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Dearborn, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Dearborn's boundary and the 15,518 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~203-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Dearborn's own centroid, the Huron/Erie Lake PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Dearbornlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Dearborn's 15,518 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wayne County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wayne 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 Wayne County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Dearborn's 15,518 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Dearborn you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 15,518 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 Dearborn-wide figureread your own land →