Ocean Beach, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
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 Ocean 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 Ocean 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 Ocean Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Ocean Beach — the short answer
Ocean Beach, New York: USDA zone 7b, about 243 days between hard freezes, across 90 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 22
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~243
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 90 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 Ocean Beach's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ocean Beach's 243-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ocean Beach
Each reading below is measured for Ocean Beach itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredOcean Beach runs about 243 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
MeasuredOcean 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 Ocean Beach is in
Ocean Beach sits in the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ocean Beach's own centroid rather than borrowed from Suffolk County.
What Grows in Ocean Beach
Every plant below cleared Ocean Beach's own zone 7b and its 243-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ocean Beach?
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 24; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 24 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 22 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Ocean Beach
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from Ocean Beach, first recorded 2021. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ocean Beach
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ocean Beach. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- S 40. 1Nitrate · 1700 ft
- S125999. 1Nitrate · 2200 ft
- S125996. 1Nitrate · 2600 ft
- S125997. 1Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- S125998. 1Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- S126000. 1Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- S125982. 1Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- S125994. 1Nitrate · 0.5 mi
- S126001. 1Nitrate · 0.6 mi
- OCEAN BEACH WATER DISTRICTPFAS · 0.9 mi
- NICKY'S ON THE BAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Fair Harbor, Fire Island, NY, well01Nitrate · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ocean 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 Ocean Beach.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ocean Beach
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ocean Beach
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Ocean Beach, Nitrate runs higher than the national average — 476 sites within ~10 miles of Ocean Beach. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
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 Ocean 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 Ocean Beach average
Your land is one point inside Ocean Beach
Everything above resolves to Ocean Beach as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 90 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 Ocean Beach Average
Ocean Beach Average
- ●USDA Zones 7b, averaged across Ocean Beach
- ●One soil character for all of Ocean Beach
- ●Frost dates read at Ocean Beach's scale: Mar 24 to Nov 22
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ocean Beach's 7b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ocean Beach
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ocean Beach, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ocean Beach averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ocean Beach — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ocean Beach average
How we know this about Ocean Beach
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 Ocean 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 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 Ocean Beach
When does frost risk typically end in Ocean Beach?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ocean Beach typically lands around Mar 24, 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 14.
When is the first frost in Ocean Beach?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ocean Beach typically arrives around Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Nov 8, so the watching starts about Oct 23 — about 243 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ocean Beach?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ocean Beach sees about 243 frost-free days — roughly Mar 24 through Nov 22, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 14 to Nov 8, about 208 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ocean Beach?
The federal record around Ocean Beach is a meaningful one — 927 documented sites, mostly Nitrate entries (476), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.3 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 Ocean Beach?
From about Oct 23 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 22 (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 22. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ocean Beach's scale — its 7b band and its 243-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ocean 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 Ocean Beach’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ocean Beach's own scale — its own ~243-day season between 28°F freezes, the 90 acres it covers and 927 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ocean Beach's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ocean Beach's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 24 and Nov 22 and the ~243-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 927 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ocean Beach, the closest Nitrate record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ocean Beach's boundary and the 90 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7b and a ~243-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ocean Beach's own centroid, the Atlantic Coastal Pine BarrensUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Ocean Beachlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Ocean Beach's 90 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 Ocean Beach's 90 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ocean 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 90 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.3 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 Ocean Beach-wide figureread your own land →
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