Gibraltar, Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Gibraltar, 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 Gibraltar 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 Gibraltar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Gibraltar — the short answer
Gibraltar, Michigan: USDA zone 6b, about 222 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 13
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~222
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City 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 6b is Gibraltar's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Gibraltar's 222-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Gibraltar
Each reading below is measured for Gibraltar itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGibraltar runs about 222 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
MeasuredGibraltar 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 Gibraltar is in
Gibraltar sits in the Huron/Erie Lake Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Gibraltar's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wayne County.
What Grows in Gibraltar
Every plant below cleared Gibraltar's own zone 6b and its 222-day season. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Gibraltar?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 8; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 5 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 13 — 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 Gibraltar
Spotted lanternfly documented 10 miles from Gibraltar, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Gibraltar
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Gibraltar. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MCLOUTH STEEL GIBRALTAR PLANTSuperfund · 850 ft
- MCLOUTH STEEL GIBRALTAR PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 850 ft
- WCXI Transmitter FacilityUnderground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- LIQUID-SOLID WASTE REDUCTION INCBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Miles Trucking & Excavating CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Edison YardUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ALS FIBERGLASSBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- Gibraltar Boat YardUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Jaddco EnterprisesUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- MI DEPT/TRANSPORTATIONBrownfields · 0.8 mi
- City of TrentonUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- John CoxUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Gibraltar'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 Gibraltar.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Gibraltar
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Gibraltar
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Gibraltar, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Gibraltar — Superfund (26 sites) and PFAS (14 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Gibraltar
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 Gibraltar average
Your land is one point inside Gibraltar
Everything above resolves to Gibraltar 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 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 Gibraltar Average
Gibraltar Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Gibraltar
- ●One soil character for all of Gibraltar
- ●Frost dates read at Gibraltar's scale: Apr 5 to Nov 13
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Gibraltar's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Gibraltar
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Gibraltar, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Gibraltar averages can't show:
We read public map data around Gibraltar — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Gibraltar average
How we know this about Gibraltar
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 Gibraltar’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 Gibraltar
When does frost risk typically end in Gibraltar?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Gibraltar typically lands around Apr 5, 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 26.
When is the first frost in Gibraltar?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Gibraltar typically arrives around Nov 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 30, so the watching starts about Oct 14 — about 222 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Gibraltar?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Gibraltar sees about 222 frost-free days — roughly Apr 5 through Nov 13, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 26 to Oct 30, about 187 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Gibraltar?
The federal record around Gibraltar runs heavier than most — 1,223 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (589), the nearest Superfund record about 0.2 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Gibraltar?
From about Oct 14 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 13 (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 13. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Gibraltar's scale — its 6b band and its 222-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Gibraltar'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 Gibraltar’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Gibraltar's own scale — its own ~222-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,360 acres it covers and 1,223 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Gibraltar's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Gibraltar's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 5 and Nov 13 and the ~222-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,223 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Gibraltar, the closest Superfund record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Gibraltar's boundary and the 2,360 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~222-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Gibraltar's own centroid, the Huron/Erie Lake PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Gibraltarlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Gibraltar's 2,360 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 Gibraltar's 2,360 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Gibraltar you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,360 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund record about 0.2 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 Gibraltar-wide figureread your own land →
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