Ogdensburg, New York, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Expect cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Ogdensburg, 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 Ogdensburg 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 Ogdensburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Ogdensburg — the short answer
Ogdensburg, New York: USDA zone 5a, about 193 days between hard freezes, across 3K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~193
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City 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 5a is Ogdensburg's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ogdensburg's 193-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ogdensburg
Each reading below is measured for Ogdensburg itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredOgdensburg runs about 193 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredOgdensburg sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 Ogdensburg is in
Ogdensburg sits in the Eastern Great Lakes Lowlands — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ogdensburg's own centroid rather than borrowed from St. Lawrence County.
What Grows in Ogdensburg
Every plant below cleared Ogdensburg's own zone 5a and its 193-day season. Each card opens that plant's New York profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ogdensburg?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. As the window narrows, the plantings just get faster — fall brassicas, then greens, then garlic to finish.
Documented around Ogdensburg
Survey cells within 31 miles of Ogdensburg checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 88 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ogdensburg
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ogdensburg. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- NYSDOT OGDENSBURG SUB-RESIDENCYBrownfields · 1300 ft
- NYS DOTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- 7-ELEVEN #40499Underground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- WALMART #2092Brownfields · 1900 ft
- PORTERS GAS STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 2300 ft
- LOWES OF OGDENSBURG NY #2401Brownfields · 2400 ft
- MATTISON PROPERTYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- OGDENSBURG(C) DPWUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- WILDER FORSYTHE INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- OGDENSBURG CITY OF DPWBrownfields · 0.7 mi
- PARKWAY EXPRESS TRAVEL CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ST. LAWRENCE PSYCHIATRIC CENTERUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ogdensburg'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 Ogdensburg.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ogdensburg
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ogdensburg
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Ogdensburg, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Ogdensburg — CAFO (14 sites) and Superfund (4 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Ogdensburg
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 Ogdensburg average
Your land is one point inside Ogdensburg
Everything above resolves to Ogdensburg 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 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 Ogdensburg Average
Ogdensburg Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Ogdensburg
- ●One soil character for all of Ogdensburg
- ●Frost dates read at Ogdensburg's scale: Apr 16 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ogdensburg's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ogdensburg
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ogdensburg, New York — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ogdensburg averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ogdensburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ogdensburg average
How we know this about Ogdensburg
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 Ogdensburg’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 Ogdensburg
When does frost risk typically end in Ogdensburg?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ogdensburg typically lands around Apr 16, 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 May 7.
When is the first frost in Ogdensburg?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ogdensburg typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 193 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ogdensburg?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ogdensburg sees about 193 frost-free days — roughly Apr 16 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 7 to Oct 12, about 158 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ogdensburg?
The federal record around Ogdensburg is a meaningful one — 169 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (102), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.2 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 Ogdensburg?
From about Sep 26 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 Oct 26 (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 Oct 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ogdensburg's scale — its 5a band and its 193-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ogdensburg'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 Ogdensburg’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ogdensburg's own scale — its own ~193-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,172 acres it covers and 169 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ogdensburg's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ogdensburg's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 16 and Oct 26 and the ~193-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 169 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ogdensburg, the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ogdensburg's boundary and the 3,172 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~193-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ogdensburg's own centroid, the Eastern Great Lakes LowlandsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Ogdensburg checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Ogdensburg's 3,172 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom St. Lawrence County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom St. Lawrence 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 St. Lawrence County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Ogdensburg's 3,172 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ogdensburg you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,172 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Ogdensburg-wide figureread your own land →