Garwood, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
Growers here do well with cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Garwood, 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 Garwood 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 Garwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Garwood — the short answer
Garwood, New Jersey: USDA zone 7a, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 416 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 14
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 416 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 7a is Garwood's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Garwood's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Garwood
Each reading below is measured for Garwood itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGarwood runs about 232 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
MeasuredGarwood sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Garwood is in
Garwood sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Garwood's own centroid rather than borrowed from Union County.
What Grows in Garwood
Every plant below cleared Garwood's own zone 7a and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Garwood?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 14 — 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 Garwood
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Garwood, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Garwood
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Garwood. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- LERMER PACKAGING CORPUnderground Storage Tanks · 100 ft
- JUMBO WASHBrownfields · 200 ft
- KINGS 3620Brownfields · 350 ft
- SOUTH AVE URBAN RENEWAL LLCBrownfields · 650 ft
- BECKLEY PERFORATING COUnderground Storage Tanks · 800 ft
- CVS PHARMACY #4131Brownfields · 800 ft
- FORMER MOBIL 15NJOUnderground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- PMG 8793Underground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- PETRO PLASTICS COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- HOME DEPOT INC #6903Brownfields · 1100 ft
- SEVERAGES AUTO SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- PATRICIAN CREATIVE FLOORS INCBrownfields · 1200 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Garwood'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 Garwood.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Garwood
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Garwood
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Garwood, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Garwood — Superfund (129 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (380 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.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Garwood
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 Garwood average
Your land is one point inside Garwood
Everything above resolves to Garwood as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 416 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 Garwood Average
Garwood Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Garwood
- ●One soil character for all of Garwood
- ●Frost dates read at Garwood's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 14
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Garwood's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Garwood
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Garwood, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Garwood averages can't show:
We read public map data around Garwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Garwood average
How we know this about Garwood
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 Garwood’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 Garwood
When does frost risk typically end in Garwood?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Garwood typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
When is the first frost in Garwood?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Garwood typically arrives around Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 31, so the watching starts about Oct 15 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Garwood?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Garwood sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 14, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 31, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Garwood?
The federal record around Garwood runs heavier than most — 5,773 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (3,585), 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 Garwood?
From about Oct 15 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 14 (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 14. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Garwood's scale — its 7a band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Garwood'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 Garwood’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Garwood's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 416 acres it covers and 5,773 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Garwood's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Garwood's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 14 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 5,773 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Garwood, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Garwood's boundary and the 416 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Garwood's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Garwoodlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Garwood's 416 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Union County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Union 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 Union County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Garwood's 416 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Garwood you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 416 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 Garwood-wide figureread your own land →