Hopelawn, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Hopelawn, 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 Hopelawn 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 Hopelawn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Hopelawn — the short answer
Hopelawn, New Jersey: USDA zone 7b, about 239 days between hard freezes, across 280 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 19
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~239
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 280 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 Hopelawn's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Hopelawn's 239-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Hopelawn
Each reading below is measured for Hopelawn itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredHopelawn runs about 239 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
MeasuredHopelawn 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 Hopelawn is in
Hopelawn sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Hopelawn's own centroid rather than borrowed from Middlesex County.
What Grows in Hopelawn
Every plant below cleared Hopelawn's own zone 7b and its 239-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Hopelawn?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 25; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 25 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 19 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around Hopelawn
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Hopelawn, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Hopelawn
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Hopelawn. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- RACEWAY WOODBRIDGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- SPEEDWAY 3478Underground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- 19 PETROLEUMUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- 7-ELEVEN #32896Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- CYPRESS TRANSPORT COMPANY INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- PATHMARK 72527Brownfields · 1800 ft
- C&G MANAGEMENTBrownfields · 1800 ft
- GETTY 00657Underground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- T J GETTY SERVICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- SHELL SERVICE STATION 138380Underground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- POLEX TIRE AND AUTO CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- T J GETTY SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Hopelawn'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 Hopelawn.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Hopelawn
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Hopelawn
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Hopelawn, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Hopelawn — Superfund (101 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (318 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around 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 Hopelawn
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 Hopelawn average
Your land is one point inside Hopelawn
Everything above resolves to Hopelawn as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 280 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 Hopelawn Average
Hopelawn Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Hopelawn
- ●One soil character for all of Hopelawn
- ●Frost dates read at Hopelawn's scale: Mar 25 to Nov 19
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Hopelawn's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Hopelawn
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Hopelawn, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Hopelawn averages can't show:
We read public map data around Hopelawn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Hopelawn average
How we know this about Hopelawn
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 Hopelawn’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 Hopelawn
When does frost risk typically end in Hopelawn?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Hopelawn typically lands around Mar 25, 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 15.
When is the first frost in Hopelawn?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Hopelawn typically arrives around Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 5, so the watching starts about Oct 20 — about 239 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Hopelawn?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Hopelawn sees about 239 frost-free days — roughly Mar 25 through Nov 19, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 15 to Nov 5, about 204 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Hopelawn?
The federal record around Hopelawn runs heavier than most — 4,685 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (2,587), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Hopelawn?
From about Oct 20 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 19 (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 19. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Hopelawn's scale — its 7b band and its 239-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Hopelawn'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 Hopelawn’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Hopelawn's own scale — its own ~239-day season between 28°F freezes, the 280 acres it covers and 4,685 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Hopelawn's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Hopelawn's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 25 and Nov 19 and the ~239-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 4,685 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Hopelawn, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Hopelawn's boundary and the 280 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~239-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Hopelawn's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Hopelawnlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Hopelawn's 280 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Middlesex County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Middlesex 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 Middlesex County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Hopelawn's 280 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Hopelawn you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 280 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Hopelawn-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Jersey
Wider growing context
What grows across New JerseyHopelawn sits outside our named growing regions, so New Jersey as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides