Port Murray, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Port Murray, 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 Port Murray 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 Port Murray — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Port Murray — the short answer
Port Murray, New Jersey: USDA zone 6b, about 201 days between hard freezes, across 633 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~201
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 633 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 6b is Port Murray's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Port Murray's 201-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Port Murray
Each reading below is measured for Port Murray itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPort Murray runs about 201 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
MeasuredPort Murray sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Port Murray is in
Port Murray sits in the Northeastern Highlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Northern Forests. That is read at Port Murray's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Warren County is mostly Ridge and Valley. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Port Murray
Every plant below cleared Port Murray's own zone 6b and its 201-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Port Murray?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 28 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Port Murray
Spotted lanternfly documented 1 miles from Port Murray, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Port Murray
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Port Murray. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MANSFIELD TWPUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- DAN BALLENTINE WELL DRILLING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- COMCAST CABLEVISION NORTHWESTBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- 410272-- ComNitrate · 0.9 mi
- WASHINGTON STATE POLICE STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- PORT COLDEN MAINTENANCE YARD AKA PORT COLDERUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- WASHINGTON ARMORYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION PORT COLDEN FACILITYBrownfields · 1.8 mi
- MOUNTAIN FARMUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.8 mi
- TOWNSHIP GARAGEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- WASHINGTON TWP BD OF EDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- 410274-- PW 4Nitrate · 2.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Port Murray'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 Port Murray.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Port Murray
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Port Murray
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Port Murray, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Port Murray — Superfund (12 sites) and Nitrate (180 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in Port Murray
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 Port Murray average
Your land is one point inside Port Murray
Everything above resolves to Port Murray as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 633 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 Port Murray Average
Port Murray Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Port Murray
- ●One soil character for all of Port Murray
- ●Frost dates read at Port Murray's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Port Murray's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Port Murray
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Port Murray, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Port Murray averages can't show:
We read public map data around Port Murray — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Port Murray average
How we know this about Port Murray
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 Port Murray’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 Port Murray
When does frost risk typically end in Port Murray?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Port Murray typically lands around Apr 10, 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 May 1.
When is the first frost in Port Murray?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Port Murray typically arrives around Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 14, so the watching starts about Sep 28 — about 201 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Port Murray?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Port Murray sees about 201 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 14, about 166 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Port Murray?
The federal record around Port Murray is a meaningful one — 645 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (337), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Port Murray?
From about Sep 28 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 Oct 28 (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 Oct 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Port Murray's scale — its 6b band and its 201-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Port Murray'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 Port Murray’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Port Murray's own scale — its own ~201-day season between 28°F freezes, the 633 acres it covers and 645 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Port Murray's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Port Murray's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 10 and Oct 28 and the ~201-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 645 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Port Murray, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Port Murray's boundary and the 633 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~201-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Port Murray sits in the Northeastern Highlands — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Port Murraylydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Port Murray's 633 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Warren County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Warren 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 Warren County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Port Murray's 633 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Port Murray you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 633 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.7 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 Port Murray-wide figureread your own land →