Neptune City, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Expect cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Neptune City, 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 Neptune City 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 Neptune City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Neptune City — the short answer
Neptune City, New Jersey: USDA zone 7b, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 573 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 23
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 573 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 Neptune City's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Neptune City's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Neptune City
Each reading below is measured for Neptune City itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNeptune City runs about 243 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
MeasuredNeptune City 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 Neptune City is in
Neptune City sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Neptune City's own centroid rather than borrowed from Monmouth County.
What Grows in Neptune City
Every plant below cleared Neptune City's own zone 7b and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Neptune City?
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 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 23 — 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 Neptune City
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Neptune City, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Neptune City
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Neptune City. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- GULFUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- NEPTUNE CITY CLEANERSBrownfields · 750 ft
- PUBLIC WORKS FACILITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- LARRISON COAL & FUEL OIL INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- SPORTSMAN SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- COAST CITIES SCHOOL BUSESUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- NEPTUNE CITY SUNOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- EXXON SERVICE STATION FORMERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- LARC 209 LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- NEPTUNE CITY BORO BD OF ED WOODROW WILSON ELEMENTARY SCHOOLBrownfields · 1900 ft
- CONTINENTAL BAKING COUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- BOROUGH OF NEPTUNE CITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Neptune City'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 Neptune City.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Neptune City
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Neptune City
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Neptune City, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Neptune City — Superfund (22 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (973 sites). 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.
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 Neptune City
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 Neptune City average
Your land is one point inside Neptune City
Everything above resolves to Neptune City as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 573 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 Neptune City Average
Neptune City Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Neptune City
- ●One soil character for all of Neptune City
- ●Frost dates read at Neptune City's scale: Mar 25 to Nov 23
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Neptune City's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Neptune City
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Neptune City, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Neptune City averages can't show:
We read public map data around Neptune City — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Neptune City average
How we know this about Neptune City
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 Neptune City’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 Neptune City
When does frost risk typically end in Neptune City?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Neptune City 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 Neptune City?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Neptune City typically arrives around Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 9, so the watching starts about Oct 24 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Neptune City?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Neptune City sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 25 through Nov 23, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 15 to Nov 9, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Neptune City?
The federal record around Neptune City runs heavier than most — 1,420 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (973), 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 Neptune City?
From about Oct 24 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 23 (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 23. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Neptune City's scale — its 7b band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Neptune City'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 Neptune City’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Neptune City's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 573 acres it covers and 1,420 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Neptune City's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Neptune City's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 25 and Nov 23 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,420 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Neptune City, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Neptune City's boundary and the 573 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Neptune City's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Neptune Citylydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Neptune City's 573 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Monmouth County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Monmouth 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 Monmouth County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Neptune City's 573 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Neptune City you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 573 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 Neptune City-wide figureread your own land →
More in New Jersey
Wider growing context
What grows across New JerseyNeptune City sits outside our named growing regions, so New Jersey as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides