Manville, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Manville, 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 Manville 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 Manville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Manville — the short answer
Manville, New Jersey: USDA zone 7a, about 215 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 2
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~215
- 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 7a is Manville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Manville's 215-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Manville
Each reading below is measured for Manville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredManville runs about 215 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
MeasuredManville 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 Manville is in
Manville sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Manville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Somerset County.
What Grows in Manville
Every plant below cleared Manville's own zone 7a and its 215-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Manville?
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 5; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 2 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 3 — 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 Manville
Spotted lanternfly documented 0 miles from Manville, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Manville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Manville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MANVILLE BOROUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- MANVILLE MASONS SUPPLY INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- SOMERSET BAKERY (FORMER)Underground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- FEDERAL CREOSOTESuperfund · 1800 ft
- MANVILLE SALES CORPORATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- ADESA NEW JERSEYBrownfields · 2000 ft
- FRAS-AIR CONTRACTING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- GERMAN AUTO SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- B & L PRINTING CO INCBrownfields · 2200 ft
- WAL-MART STORE 2651Brownfields · 2200 ft
- FEDERAL CREOSOTE SUPERFUND SITEBrownfields · 2300 ft
- PHILIP MIGLIORES GAS STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Manville'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 Manville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Manville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Manville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Manville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Manville — Superfund (66 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (197 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 Manville
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 Manville average
Your land is one point inside Manville
Everything above resolves to Manville 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 Manville Average
Manville Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Manville
- ●One soil character for all of Manville
- ●Frost dates read at Manville's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Manville's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Manville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Manville, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Manville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Manville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Manville average
How we know this about Manville
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 Manville’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 Manville
When does frost risk typically end in Manville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Manville typically lands around Apr 2, 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 23.
When is the first frost in Manville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Manville typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 215 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Manville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Manville sees about 215 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 20, about 180 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Manville?
The federal record around Manville runs heavier than most — 2,351 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (1,279), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Manville?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Manville's scale — its 7a band and its 215-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Manville'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 Manville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Manville's own scale — its own ~215-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,511 acres it covers and 2,351 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Manville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Manville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 3 and the ~215-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,351 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Manville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Manville's boundary and the 1,511 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~215-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Manville's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Manvillelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Manville's 1,511 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Somerset County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Somerset 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 Somerset County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Manville's 1,511 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Manville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,511 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Manville-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Jersey
Wider growing context
What grows across New JerseyManville sits outside our named growing regions, so New Jersey as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides