East Hampton, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in East Hampton, 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 East Hampton 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 East Hampton — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
East Hampton — the short answer
East Hampton, New York: USDA zone 7b, about 234 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 20
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~234
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 3K 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 East Hampton's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against East Hampton's 234-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in East Hampton
Each reading below is measured for East Hampton itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredEast Hampton runs about 234 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
MeasuredEast Hampton 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 East Hampton is in
East Hampton sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at East Hampton's own centroid rather than borrowed from Suffolk County.
What Grows in East Hampton
Every plant below cleared East Hampton's own zone 7b and its 234-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in East Hampton?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 20 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around East Hampton
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from East Hampton, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near East Hampton
Closest first, within ~10 miles of East Hampton. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Temp well at end of Terbell Ln, East Hampton, NYNitrate · 2100 ft
- GEORGIA SERVICES LTDBrownfields · 2300 ft
- EAST HAMPTON VETERINARY GROUP PCBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- EAST HAMPTON STAR THEBrownfields · 0.5 mi
- SUFFOLK COUNTY WATER AUTHORITYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Temp well 01 - Maidstone, E Hampton, NYNitrate · 0.6 mi
- S 49422. 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- S 2415. 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- S 73332. 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- S 52686. 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- S 2570. 1Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- S 2405. 1Nitrate · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from East Hampton'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 East Hampton.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of East Hampton
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of East Hampton
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around East Hampton, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 222 sites within ~10 miles of East Hampton. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Check your specific parcel in East Hampton
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 East Hampton average
Your land is one point inside East Hampton
Everything above resolves to East Hampton as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 3K 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 East Hampton Average
East Hampton Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across East Hampton
- ●One soil character for all of East Hampton
- ●Frost dates read at East Hampton's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not East Hampton's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in East Hampton
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in East Hampton, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that East Hampton averages can't show:
We read public map data around East Hampton — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the East Hampton average
How we know this about East Hampton
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 East Hampton’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 East Hampton
When does frost risk typically end in East Hampton?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in East Hampton typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
When is the first frost in East Hampton?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in East Hampton typically arrives around Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 6, so the watching starts about Oct 21 — about 234 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in East Hampton?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, East Hampton sees about 234 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Nov 6, about 199 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in East Hampton?
The federal record around East Hampton is a meaningful one — 288 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (222), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.4 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 East Hampton?
From about Oct 21 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 20 (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 20. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at East Hampton's scale — its 7b band and its 234-day season. Your yard writes its own version of East Hampton'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 East Hampton’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at East Hampton's own scale — its own ~234-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,052 acres it covers and 288 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- East Hampton's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- East Hampton's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 20 and the ~234-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 288 documented contamination sites on the federal record near East Hampton, the closest Nitrate record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- East Hampton's boundary and the 3,052 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~234-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at East Hampton's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of East Hamptonlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so East Hampton's 3,052 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Suffolk County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Suffolk County
- The growing challenges every New York grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom New York
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Suffolk County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among East Hampton's 3,052 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of East Hampton you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,052 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate 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 East Hampton-wide figureread your own land →