Ridgefield, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
These conditions suit cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Ridgefield, 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 Ridgefield 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 Ridgefield — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Ridgefield — the short answer
Ridgefield, New Jersey: USDA zone 7b, about 255 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~255
- 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 7b is Ridgefield's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ridgefield's 255-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ridgefield
Each reading below is measured for Ridgefield itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRidgefield runs about 255 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
MeasuredRidgefield 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 Ridgefield is in
Ridgefield sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ridgefield's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bergen County.
What Grows in Ridgefield
Every plant below cleared Ridgefield's own zone 7b and its 255-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ridgefield?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 20; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 20 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 30 — 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 Ridgefield
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from Ridgefield, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ridgefield
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ridgefield. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PSE&G NEW BERGEN STATIONBrownfields · 400 ft
- US FILTER IONPURE INCToxics Release Inventory · 650 ft
- US FILTER IONPURE INCBrownfields · 650 ft
- JOHN DALESIO & SONS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- RIDGEFIELD CEMETERYUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- PUBLIC WORKS BUILDINGUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- DAVDET USA INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- GROOV PIN CORPORATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- CAMATRON SEWING MACHINE INCBrownfields · 1100 ft
- RIDGE PRINTING COMPANY INCORPORATEDUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- LIESELOTTE KOHLSAAT ESTATEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- NICOLA MATERA & SONS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ridgefield'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 Ridgefield.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ridgefield
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ridgefield
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •TRI facilities report what they release. Check the wind — downwind beds catch more of it.
Check your specific parcel in Ridgefield
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 Ridgefield average
Your land is one point inside Ridgefield
Everything above resolves to Ridgefield 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 Ridgefield Average
Ridgefield Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Ridgefield
- ●One soil character for all of Ridgefield
- ●Frost dates read at Ridgefield's scale: Mar 20 to Nov 30
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ridgefield's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ridgefield
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ridgefield, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ridgefield averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ridgefield — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ridgefield average
How we know this about Ridgefield
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 Ridgefield’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 Ridgefield
When does frost risk typically end in Ridgefield?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ridgefield typically lands around Mar 20, 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 10.
When is the first frost in Ridgefield?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ridgefield typically arrives around Nov 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 16, so the watching starts about Oct 31 — about 255 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ridgefield?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ridgefield sees about 255 frost-free days — roughly Mar 20 through Nov 30, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 10 to Nov 16, about 220 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ridgefield?
The federal record around Ridgefield runs heavier than most — 15,886 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (9,229), the nearest Brownfields 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 Ridgefield?
From about Oct 31 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 30 (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 30. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ridgefield's scale — its 7b band and its 255-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ridgefield'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 Ridgefield’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ridgefield's own scale — its own ~255-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,628 acres it covers and 15,886 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ridgefield's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ridgefield's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 20 and Nov 30 and the ~255-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 15,886 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ridgefield, the closest Brownfields record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ridgefield's boundary and the 1,628 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~255-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ridgefield's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Ridgefieldlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Ridgefield's 1,628 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bergen County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bergen 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 Bergen County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Ridgefield's 1,628 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ridgefield you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,628 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Ridgefield-wide figureread your own land →