North Caldwell, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in North Caldwell, 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 North Caldwell 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 North Caldwell — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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North Caldwell — the short answer
North Caldwell, New Jersey: USDA zone 7a, about 218 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 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~218
- 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 North Caldwell's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against North Caldwell's 218-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in North Caldwell
Each reading below is measured for North Caldwell itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNorth Caldwell runs about 218 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
MeasuredNorth Caldwell 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 North Caldwell is in
North Caldwell sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at North Caldwell's own centroid rather than borrowed from Essex County.
What Grows in North Caldwell
Every plant below cleared North Caldwell's own zone 7a and its 218-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in North Caldwell?
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 6 — 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 North Caldwell
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from North Caldwell, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near North Caldwell
Closest first, within ~10 miles of North Caldwell. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- NORTH CALDWELL TWP PUBLIC SAFETY BUILDINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- WEST ESSEX RGNL SD WEST ESSEX HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- WEST ESSEX REGIONAL SCHOOL DISTRICTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- FLUID SYSTEMS INCBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- CALDWELL TRUCKING CO.Superfund · 1.0 mi
- GENERAL HOSE PRODUCTS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- NATIONAL PRECISION TOOL CO., INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 1.1 mi
- GENERAL HOSE PRODUCTS INCToxics Release Inventory · 1.1 mi
- CALDWELL TRUCKING COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CALDWELL TRUCKING COMPANY INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CARL SCHAEDEL & CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- QUAGEN PHARMABrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from North Caldwell'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 North Caldwell.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of North Caldwell
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of North Caldwell
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around North Caldwell, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of North Caldwell — Superfund (159 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (409 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 North Caldwell
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 North Caldwell average
Your land is one point inside North Caldwell
Everything above resolves to North Caldwell 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 North Caldwell Average
North Caldwell Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across North Caldwell
- ●One soil character for all of North Caldwell
- ●Frost dates read at North Caldwell's scale: Apr 2 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not North Caldwell's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in North Caldwell
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in North Caldwell, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that North Caldwell averages can't show:
We read public map data around North Caldwell — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the North Caldwell average
How we know this about North Caldwell
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 North Caldwell’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 North Caldwell
When does frost risk typically end in North Caldwell?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in North Caldwell 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 North Caldwell?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in North Caldwell typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 218 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in North Caldwell?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, North Caldwell sees about 218 frost-free days — roughly Apr 2 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 23 to Oct 23, about 183 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in North Caldwell?
The federal record around North Caldwell runs heavier than most — 6,116 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (3,920), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 North Caldwell?
From about Oct 7 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 6 (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 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at North Caldwell's scale — its 7a band and its 218-day season. Your yard writes its own version of North Caldwell'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 North Caldwell’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at North Caldwell's own scale — its own ~218-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,964 acres it covers and 6,116 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- North Caldwell's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- North Caldwell's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 2 and Nov 6 and the ~218-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 6,116 documented contamination sites on the federal record near North Caldwell, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- North Caldwell's boundary and the 1,964 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~218-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at North Caldwell's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of North Caldwelllydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so North Caldwell's 1,964 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Essex County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Essex 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 Essex County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among North Caldwell's 1,964 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of North Caldwell you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,964 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 North Caldwell-wide figureread your own land →