Camden, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Camden, 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 Camden 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 Camden — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Camden — the short answer
Camden, New Jersey: USDA zone 7b, about 254 days between hard freezes, across 6K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 17
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~254
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 6K 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 7b is Camden's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Camden's 254-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Camden
Each reading below is measured for Camden itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCamden runs about 254 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
MeasuredCamden sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b.
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 Camden is in
Camden sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Camden's own centroid rather than borrowed from Camden County.
What Grows in Camden
Every plant below cleared Camden's own zone 7b and its 254-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Camden?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 17; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 17 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 26 — 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 Camden
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Camden, first recorded 2018. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Camden
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Camden. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- FOOD BANK OF SOUTH JERSEYUnderground Storage Tanks · 250 ft
- BLOCK 364 LOT 2Underground Storage Tanks · 350 ft
- 1240 WALNUT STREET SITEUnderground Storage Tanks · 400 ft
- CAMPBELL SOUP COMPANY WAREHOUSEUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- 070078-- PW 5NNitrate · 650 ft
- FRANCIS METAL FABRICATORS INCORPORATEDSuperfund · 750 ft
- STRACO CONSTRUCTION COUnderground Storage Tanks · 950 ft
- MONSANTO CHEMICAL COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- MONSANTO COToxics Release Inventory · 1000 ft
- CAMPBELL SOUP COBrownfields · 1100 ft
- CAMDETT CORPToxics Release Inventory · 1100 ft
- CAMDEN BROADCAST FACILITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Camden'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 Camden.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Camden
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Camden
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Camden, Superfund runs higher than the national average — 116 sites within ~10 miles of Camden. 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 Camden
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 Camden average
Your land is one point inside Camden
Everything above resolves to Camden as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 6K 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 Camden Average
Camden Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Camden
- ●One soil character for all of Camden
- ●Frost dates read at Camden's scale: Mar 17 to Nov 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Camden's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Camden
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Camden, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Camden averages can't show:
We read public map data around Camden — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Camden average
How we know this about Camden
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 Camden’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 Camden
When does frost risk typically end in Camden?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Camden typically lands around Mar 17, 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 7.
When is the first frost in Camden?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Camden typically arrives around Nov 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 12, so the watching starts about Oct 27 — about 254 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Camden?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Camden sees about 254 frost-free days — roughly Mar 17 through Nov 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 7 to Nov 12, about 219 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Camden?
The federal record around Camden runs heavier than most — 6,412 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (3,236), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Camden?
From about Oct 27 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Camden's scale — its 7b band and its 254-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Camden'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 Camden’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Camden's own scale — its own ~254-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,708 acres it covers and 6,412 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Camden's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Camden's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 17 and Nov 26 and the ~254-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 6,412 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Camden, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Camden's boundary and the 5,708 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~254-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Camden's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Camdenlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Camden's 5,708 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Camden County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Camden County
- The growing challenges every New Jersey grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New Jersey
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Camden County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Camden's 5,708 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Camden you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,708 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Camden-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Jersey
Wider growing context
What grows across New JerseyCamden sits outside our named growing regions, so New Jersey as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides