North Babylon, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Well-matched crops include cabbage, prickly pear, california poppy, and collard greens, and the gap between "grows in the area" and "grows in your yard" is closed by soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in North Babylon, 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 North Babylon 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 North Babylon — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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North Babylon — the short answer
North Babylon, New York: USDA zone 7b, about 238 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- 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
- ~238
- 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 North Babylon's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against North Babylon's 238-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in North Babylon
Each reading below is measured for North Babylon itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNorth Babylon runs about 238 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
MeasuredNorth Babylon 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 North Babylon is in
North Babylon sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at North Babylon's own centroid rather than borrowed from Suffolk County.
What Grows in North Babylon
Every plant below cleared North Babylon's own zone 7b and its 238-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in North Babylon?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (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. With a season this long, “too late” mostly means “switch crops” — second sowings and a full fall garden are the norm, with garlic closing the year.
Documented around North Babylon
Spotted lanternfly documented 2 miles from North Babylon, first recorded 2022. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near North Babylon
Closest first, within ~10 miles of North Babylon. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- S 20635. 1Nitrate · 900 ft
- S 12710. 1Nitrate · 900 ft
- S 16256. 1Nitrate · 900 ft
- S 37861. 1Nitrate · 900 ft
- S 74489. 1Nitrate · 1100 ft
- S 21900. 1Nitrate · 1500 ft
- BABYLON TOWN OF MICROGRAPHICS ROOMBrownfields · 2000 ft
- S 56356. 1Nitrate · 2200 ft
- RITE AID #10623Brownfields · 2300 ft
- ALL STOP PHOTOBrownfields · 2300 ft
- NORTH BABYLON UFSD NORTH BABYLON H SBrownfields · 2500 ft
- TACO BELL #294-614Brownfields · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from North Babylon'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 North Babylon.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of North Babylon
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of North Babylon
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around North Babylon, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of North Babylon — Nitrate (1,490 sites) and Superfund (50 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Nitrate: Nitrate contamination primarily comes from agricultural fertilizer runoff and failing septic systems.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Test well water for nitrate if you rely on a private well for irrigation (EPA standard: 10 mg/L).
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in North Babylon
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 North Babylon average
Your land is one point inside North Babylon
Everything above resolves to North Babylon 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 North Babylon Average
North Babylon Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across North Babylon
- ●One soil character for all of North Babylon
- ●Frost dates read at North Babylon's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 20
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not North Babylon's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in North Babylon
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in North Babylon, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that North Babylon averages can't show:
We read public map data around North Babylon — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the North Babylon average
How we know this about North Babylon
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 North Babylon’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 North Babylon
When does frost risk typically end in North Babylon?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in North Babylon typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
When is the first frost in North Babylon?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in North Babylon 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 238 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in North Babylon?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, North Babylon sees about 238 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 20, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Nov 6, about 203 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in North Babylon?
The federal record around North Babylon runs heavier than most — 3,289 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (1,490), 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 North Babylon?
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 North Babylon's scale — its 7b band and its 238-day season. Your yard writes its own version of North Babylon'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 North Babylon’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at North Babylon's own scale — its own ~238-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,110 acres it covers and 3,289 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- North Babylon's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- North Babylon's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 20 and the ~238-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 3,289 documented contamination sites on the federal record near North Babylon, the closest Nitrate record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- North Babylon's boundary and the 2,110 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~238-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at North Babylon's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of North Babylonlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so North Babylon's 2,110 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 North Babylon's 2,110 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of North Babylon you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,110 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 North Babylon-wide figureread your own land →
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