Long Beach, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
The conditions favor cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Long Beach, 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 Long Beach 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 Long Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Long Beach — the short answer
Long Beach, New York: USDA zone 7b, about 256 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- 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)
- Dec 1
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~256
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City 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 Long Beach's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Long Beach's 256-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Long Beach
Each reading below is measured for Long Beach itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLong Beach runs about 256 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
MeasuredLong Beach 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 Long Beach is in
Long Beach sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Long Beach's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Nassau County is mostly Northeastern Coastal Zone. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Long Beach
Every plant below cleared Long Beach's own zone 7b and its 256-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Long Beach?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. 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 Dec 1 — 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 Long Beach
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Long Beach, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Long Beach
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Long Beach. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ENP ENVIRONMENTAL INCBrownfields · 550 ft
- TILBEN PHOTOBrownfields · 950 ft
- TRANSCONTINENTAL GAS PIPE LINE CO LLC - LONG BEACH METER STATIONBrownfields · 1100 ft
- N 11002. 1Nitrate · 1200 ft
- DELTA CLEANERS & SHIRTSBrownfields · 1300 ft
- MICHAEL'S TAILORING & DRY CLEANINGBrownfields · 1300 ft
- DELTA CLEANERS INCBrownfields · 1300 ft
- FOUR WSBrownfields · 1400 ft
- NASSAU CO DPW LONG BEACH RD BRDIGE - BIN #3300302Brownfields · 1400 ft
- N 13550. 1Nitrate · 2100 ft
- N 13879. 1Nitrate · 2100 ft
- NU-CLEAR CLEANERSBrownfields · 2100 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Long Beach'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 Long Beach.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Long Beach
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Long Beach
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Long Beach, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 980 sites within ~10 miles of Long Beach. 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 Long Beach
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 Long Beach average
Your land is one point inside Long Beach
Everything above resolves to Long Beach 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 city 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 Long Beach Average
Long Beach Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Long Beach
- ●One soil character for all of Long Beach
- ●Frost dates read at Long Beach's scale: Mar 20 to Dec 1
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Long Beach's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Long Beach
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Long Beach, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Long Beach averages can't show:
We read public map data around Long Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Long Beach average
How we know this about Long Beach
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Long Beach’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Long Beach
When does frost risk typically end in Long Beach?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Long Beach 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 Long Beach?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Long Beach typically arrives around Dec 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 17, so the watching starts about Nov 1 — about 256 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Long Beach?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Long Beach sees about 256 frost-free days — roughly Mar 20 through Dec 1, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 10 to Nov 17, about 221 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Long Beach?
The federal record around Long Beach is a meaningful one — 2,484 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (980), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.1 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 Long Beach?
From about Nov 1 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 Dec 1 (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 Dec 1. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Long Beach's scale — its 7b band and its 256-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Long Beach'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 Long Beach’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Long Beach's own scale — its own ~256-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,420 acres it covers and 2,484 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Long Beach's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Long Beach's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 20 and Dec 1 and the ~256-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,484 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Long Beach, the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Long Beach's boundary and the 1,420 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~256-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Long Beach sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Long Beachlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Long Beach's 1,420 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Nassau County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Nassau 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 Nassau County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Long Beach's 1,420 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Long Beach you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,420 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 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 Long Beach-wide figureread your own land →