South Rockwood, Michigan, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
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 South Rockwood, 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 South Rockwood 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 South Rockwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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South Rockwood — the short answer
South Rockwood, Michigan: USDA zone 6b, about 217 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~217
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town 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 South Rockwood's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against South Rockwood's 217-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in South Rockwood
Each reading below is measured for South Rockwood itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSouth Rockwood runs about 217 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
MeasuredSouth Rockwood 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 South Rockwood is in
South Rockwood sits in the Huron/Erie Lake Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at South Rockwood's own centroid rather than borrowed from Monroe County.
What Grows in South Rockwood
Every plant below cleared South Rockwood's own zone 6b and its 217-day season. Each card opens that plant's Michigan profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in South Rockwood?
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 9; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 6 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — 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 South Rockwood
Spotted lanternfly documented 14 miles from South Rockwood, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near South Rockwood
Closest first, within ~10 miles of South Rockwood. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- F W Ritter Sons CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- ROCK RECYCLERSBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Chapp & Bushey Oil CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- Golf Course Maintenance AreaUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- Ford Chapel/allore Funeral HomeUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Speedway #2205Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- SPEEDWAY LLCBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- Rockwood FuelUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Speedway #8833Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- BMI REFACTORIESToxics Release Inventory · 1.3 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL #15333Brownfields · 1.3 mi
- St Marys Of RockwoodUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from South Rockwood'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 South Rockwood.
Total Sites
844
within ~10 miles of South Rockwood
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
16 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of South Rockwood
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of South Rockwood
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around South Rockwood, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of South Rockwood — PFAS (11 sites) and Superfund (16 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in South Rockwood
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 South Rockwood average
Your land is one point inside South Rockwood
Everything above resolves to South Rockwood 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 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 South Rockwood Average
South Rockwood Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across South Rockwood
- ●One soil character for all of South Rockwood
- ●Frost dates read at South Rockwood's scale: Apr 6 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not South Rockwood's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in South Rockwood
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in South Rockwood, Michigan — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that South Rockwood averages can't show:
We read public map data around South Rockwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the South Rockwood average
How we know this about South Rockwood
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 South Rockwood’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 South Rockwood
When does frost risk typically end in South Rockwood?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in South Rockwood typically lands around Apr 6, 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 27.
When is the first frost in South Rockwood?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in South Rockwood typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 217 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in South Rockwood?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, South Rockwood sees about 217 frost-free days — roughly Apr 6 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 27 to Oct 26, about 182 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in South Rockwood?
The federal record around South Rockwood is a meaningful one — 844 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (394), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 South Rockwood?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at South Rockwood's scale — its 6b band and its 217-day season. Your yard writes its own version of South Rockwood'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 South Rockwood’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at South Rockwood's own scale — its own ~217-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,096 acres it covers and 844 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- South Rockwood's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- South Rockwood's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 6 and Nov 9 and the ~217-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 844 documented contamination sites on the federal record near South Rockwood, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.6 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- South Rockwood's boundary and the 2,096 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~217-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at South Rockwood's own centroid, the Huron/Erie Lake PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of South Rockwoodlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so South Rockwood's 2,096 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Monroe County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Monroe 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 Monroe County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among South Rockwood's 2,096 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of South Rockwood you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,096 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 South Rockwood-wide figureread your own land →
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