Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Manitou Beach-Devils Lake — the short answer
Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, Michigan: USDA zone 6a, about 188 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~188
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 4K 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's 188-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Each reading below is measured for Manitou Beach-Devils Lake itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredManitou Beach-Devils Lake runs about 188 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
MeasuredManitou Beach-Devils Lake 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake is in
Manitou Beach-Devils Lake sits in the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Manitou Beach-Devils Lake'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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Every plant below cleared Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's own zone 6a and its 188-day season. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. 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 24 — 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Survey cells within 31 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 38 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FRED SEMELKABrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Former Devils Lake MarinaUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Sterling Mkts IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- GLAMOUR AUTO SHOPBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- Lightning Quick Gas n Go #1Underground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Sun & Snow MarinaUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- Addison School Bus GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.0 mi
- Asphalt PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- Lenawee Farm Bureau Oil CoopUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Village Of AddisonUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- ADDISON COMMUNITY SCHOOLSBrownfields · 3.3 mi
- Addison Lumber CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Manitou Beach-Devils Lake'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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake.
Total Sites
148
within ~10 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 97 sites within ~10 miles of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake average
Your land is one point inside Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Everything above resolves to Manitou Beach-Devils Lake as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake Average
Manitou Beach-Devils Lake Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
- ●One soil character for all of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
- ●Frost dates read at Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's scale: Apr 19 to Oct 24
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Manitou Beach-Devils Lake averages can't show:
We read public map data around Manitou Beach-Devils Lake — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Manitou Beach-Devils Lake average
How we know this about Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake’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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake
When does frost risk typically end in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake 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.
When is the first frost in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake typically arrives around Oct 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 10, so the watching starts about Sep 24 — about 188 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Manitou Beach-Devils Lake sees about 188 frost-free days — roughly Apr 19 through Oct 24, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 10 to Oct 10, about 153 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
The federal record around Manitou Beach-Devils Lake is a meaningful one — 148 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (97), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.6 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake?
From about Sep 24 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 24 (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 24. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's scale — its 6a band and its 188-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake'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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's own scale — its own ~188-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,894 acres it covers and 148 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 19 and Oct 24 and the ~188-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 148 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Manitou Beach-Devils Lake, the closest Brownfields record about 0.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's boundary and the 3,894 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~188-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Manitou Beach-Devils Lake sits in the Southern Michigan/Northern Indiana Drift Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Manitou Beach-Devils Lake 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's 3,894 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake's 3,894 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Manitou Beach-Devils Lake you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,894 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.6 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 Manitou Beach-Devils Lake-wide figureread your own land →
More in Michigan
Wider growing context
What grows across MichiganManitou Beach-Devils Lake sits outside our named growing regions, so Michigan as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides