Pine Brook, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Pine Brook, 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 Pine Brook 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 Pine Brook — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Pine Brook — the short answer
Pine Brook, New Jersey: USDA zone 7a, about 223 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~223
- 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 Pine Brook's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pine Brook's 223-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Pine Brook
Each reading below is measured for Pine Brook itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPine Brook runs about 223 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
MeasuredPine Brook 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 Pine Brook is in
Pine Brook sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Pine Brook's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Morris County is mostly Northeastern Highlands. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Pine Brook
Every plant below cleared Pine Brook's own zone 7a and its 223-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Pine Brook?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — 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 Pine Brook
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Pine Brook, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Pine Brook
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Pine Brook. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- EOD ALESSANDRO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- GGI GLASS DISTRIBUTORS dba BOSS GLASSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- 270195-- PW 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- BERGEN BRUNSWIG DRUG COMPANY CORPORATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- CHRISTINE VALMYBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- PINEBROOK TIRE COUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- FANTASTIC DRY CLEANINGSuperfund · 0.6 mi
- PINE BROOK SHELLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- COMPRESSED GAS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ALVOGEN INCBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- SWEDA BUILDINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- PINE BROOK TRANSMISSIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pine Brook'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 Pine Brook.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Pine Brook
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Pine Brook
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pine Brook, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Pine Brook — Superfund (96 sites) and PFAS (34 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.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Pine Brook
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 Pine Brook average
Your land is one point inside Pine Brook
Everything above resolves to Pine Brook 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 Pine Brook Average
Pine Brook Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Pine Brook
- ●One soil character for all of Pine Brook
- ●Frost dates read at Pine Brook's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pine Brook's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Pine Brook
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pine Brook, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pine Brook averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pine Brook — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pine Brook average
How we know this about Pine Brook
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 Pine Brook’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 Pine Brook
When does frost risk typically end in Pine Brook?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pine Brook typically lands around Mar 30, 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 20.
When is the first frost in Pine Brook?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Pine Brook typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 223 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Pine Brook?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pine Brook sees about 223 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 25, about 188 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pine Brook?
The federal record around Pine Brook runs heavier than most — 3,695 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (2,279), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Pine Brook?
From about Oct 9 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 8 (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 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Pine Brook's scale — its 7a band and its 223-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pine Brook'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 Pine Brook’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Pine Brook's own scale — its own ~223-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,025 acres it covers and 3,695 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pine Brook's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pine Brook's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 8 and the ~223-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 3,695 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Pine Brook, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Pine Brook's boundary and the 2,025 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~223-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Pine Brook sits in the Northern Piedmont — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Pine Brooklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Pine Brook's 2,025 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Morris County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Morris 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 Morris County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Pine Brook's 2,025 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Pine Brook you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,025 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Pine Brook-wide figureread your own land →