Monmouth County, in New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Monmouth County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Monmouth County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Monmouth County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Monmouth County — the short answer
Monmouth County, New Jersey: USDA zone 7a, about 226 days between hard freezes, across 300K acres.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~226
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 300K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 7a is Monmouth County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Monmouth County's 226-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Monmouth County
Across a year, Monmouth County accumulates about 3,235 growing degree days above 50°F, about 87 fewer than the middle New Jersey county — ahead of 7 of New Jersey’s 21 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Monmouth County
Across Monmouth County, the ground is predominantly Ultisols, where Freehold, Evesboro, and Tinton are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally well drained with a sandy loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 4.3–5.5, very strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group B soils.
Soil order
Ultisols
Drainage
Well drained
Prime farmland
24%
Hydric soils
22%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Monmouth County
The USDA soil survey maps 44% of Monmouth County as well drained — but another 50% drains differently: 17% poorly drained, 13% moderately well drained.
Freehold is the most extensive named soil at 17% of mapped acres, then Evesboro (9%) and Tinton (7%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Monmouth County
Each reading below is measured for Monmouth County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Monmouth County are well drained, in hydrologic group B — ground that drains quickly.
The upside is soil you can work early in spring and roots that never drown; the cost is that fast-draining ground dries out fast and leaches nutrients away before plants can use them.
Work in compost and mulch to hold moisture and feed, and water more often in short doses than deep and rarely.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Monmouth County runs about pH 4.3–5.5, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Wet ground
MeasuredAbout 22% of Monmouth County is mapped as hydric — wetland — soil.
If your lot falls in one of those pockets, a standard in-ground bed will fight waterlogging all season, and roots that need air will struggle.
Check how your own ground drains before you dig; raised beds or moisture-loving plantings turn a wet corner from a problem into a niche.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredMonmouth County runs about 226 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
The kind of country Monmouth County is in
Monmouth County sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Monmouth County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Monmouth County's own USDA zone 7a and its own 226-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile.
Is it too late to plant in Monmouth County?
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 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Monmouth County
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Monmouth County, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
- Japanese beetle5 documented records
- monarch butterfly765 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Monmouth County
USGS estimates 9,466 lb of Glyphosate on Monmouth County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (2,302 lb) and Metolachlor-s (2,058 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Monmouth County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Monmouth County — 2,514 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 34 Superfund sites. Sites tracked in EPA's Superfund program — from assessment-stage CERCLIS entries to confirmed National Priorities List cleanup sites.
Monmouth County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Monmouth County
Closest first, across Monmouth County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CITGOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- SHORE AUTO WRECKING (FORMER)Underground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- ORCHARD MARKETS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- JAMES NURSERYBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- COLTS NECK PUBLIC WORKS GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- NAVAL WEAPONS STATION EARLEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- COLTS NECK PHARMACYBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- SHELDON VOGEL - RESIDENCEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- 250045-- IrrNitrate · 1.3 mi
- 250034-- 2(B)Nitrate · 1.4 mi
- COLTS NECK VOR/DMEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- WILLIAMSBURG ASSOC INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Monmouth County'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 Monmouth County.
Sources Checked
across Monmouth County
Severity Distribution
across Monmouth County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Monmouth County, two things run higher than the national average across Monmouth County — Superfund (34 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (1,637 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.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Monmouth County
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 Monmouth County average
Your land is one point inside Monmouth County
Everything above resolves to Monmouth County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 300K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Monmouth County Average
Monmouth County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Monmouth County
- ●One soil character for all of Monmouth County
- ●Frost dates read at Monmouth County's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Monmouth County's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Monmouth County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Monmouth County, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Monmouth County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Monmouth County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Monmouth County average
How we know this about Monmouth County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Monmouth County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Monmouth County
When does frost risk typically end in Monmouth County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Monmouth County typically lands around Mar 30, 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 20.
How long is the growing season in Monmouth County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Monmouth County sees about 226 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 28, about 191 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Monmouth County?
The federal record around Monmouth County runs heavier than most — 2,514 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,637), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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.
Everything above is measured at Monmouth County's scale — its 7a band and its 226-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Monmouth County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads New Jersey's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Monmouth County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Monmouth County's own scale — its own ~226-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 2,514 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Monmouth County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Monmouth County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~226-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Monmouth CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 2,514 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Monmouth County's boundary and the 299,650 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~226-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Monmouth County sitting wholly inside the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Monmouth County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Monmouth County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every New Jersey grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New Jersey
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Monmouth County — the ~226 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Monmouth County's 299,650 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 2,514 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Monmouth Countyread your own land →