Ridgefield Park, New Jersey, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
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 Park, 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 Park 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 Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Ridgefield Park — the short answer
Ridgefield Park, New Jersey: USDA zone 7b, about 251 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~251
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 1K 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 Park's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ridgefield Park's 251-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ridgefield Park
Each reading below is measured for Ridgefield Park itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredRidgefield Park runs about 251 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 Park 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 Park is in
Ridgefield Park sits in the Northern Piedmont — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ridgefield Park's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bergen County.
What Grows in Ridgefield Park
Every plant below cleared Ridgefield Park's own zone 7b and its 251-day season. Each card opens that plant's New Jersey profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ridgefield Park?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 22; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 22 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 28 — 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 Park
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Ridgefield Park, first recorded 2019. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ridgefield Park
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ridgefield Park. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 030282-- Swim Clb 1Nitrate · 1200 ft
- SPECIALTY RX INC PHARMACYBrownfields · 1300 ft
- CVS PHARMACY #0975Brownfields · 1600 ft
- SUMMERTON INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- TUMINOS TOWING INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- TEXACO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- LIGHTNING LUBE CENTERS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- PALISADE SAVINGS BANK SLAUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- LUKOIL #57229Underground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- BRIDGE TEXACO SERVICE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- RIDGEFIELD PARK CITGOUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- BAGNATO & SONS PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ridgefield Park'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 Park.
Total Sites
14,134
within ~10 miles of Ridgefield Park
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
143 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ridgefield Park
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ridgefield Park
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 Park
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 Park average
Your land is one point inside Ridgefield Park
Everything above resolves to Ridgefield Park as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K 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 Park Average
Ridgefield Park Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Ridgefield Park
- ●One soil character for all of Ridgefield Park
- ●Frost dates read at Ridgefield Park's scale: Mar 22 to Nov 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ridgefield Park's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ridgefield Park
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ridgefield Park, New Jersey — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ridgefield Park averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ridgefield Park — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ridgefield Park average
How we know this about Ridgefield Park
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 Park’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 Park
When does frost risk typically end in Ridgefield Park?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ridgefield Park typically lands around Mar 22, 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 12.
When is the first frost in Ridgefield Park?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ridgefield Park typically arrives around Nov 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 14, so the watching starts about Oct 29 — about 251 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ridgefield Park?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ridgefield Park sees about 251 frost-free days — roughly Mar 22 through Nov 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 12 to Nov 14, about 216 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ridgefield Park?
The federal record around Ridgefield Park runs heavier than most — 14,134 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (8,290), the nearest Nitrate 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 Ridgefield Park?
From about Oct 29 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 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 Nov 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ridgefield Park's scale — its 7b band and its 251-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ridgefield Park'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 Park’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ridgefield Park's own scale — its own ~251-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,091 acres it covers and 14,134 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ridgefield Park's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ridgefield Park's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 22 and Nov 28 and the ~251-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 14,134 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ridgefield Park, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ridgefield Park's boundary and the 1,091 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~251-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ridgefield Park's own centroid, the Northern PiedmontUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Ridgefield Parklydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Ridgefield Park's 1,091 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 Park's 1,091 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ridgefield Park you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,091 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 Ridgefield Park-wide figureread your own land →