Berlin, Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Berlin, 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 Berlin 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 Berlin — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Berlin — the short answer
Berlin, Ohio: USDA zone 6a, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- 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 6a is Berlin's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Berlin's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Berlin
Each reading below is measured for Berlin itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBerlin runs about 216 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
MeasuredBerlin sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Berlin is in
Berlin sits in the Western Allegheny Plateau — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Berlin's own centroid rather than borrowed from Holmes County.
What Grows in Berlin
Every plant below cleared Berlin's own zone 6a and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Berlin?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 9; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 6 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 8 — 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 Berlin
Survey cells within 31 miles of Berlin checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 38 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Berlin
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Berlin. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- CENTOR INCBrownfields · 1100 ft
- CENTOR INCToxics Release Inventory · 1100 ft
- SCHROCKS WOODCRAFTS, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- STUTZMAN MOTORSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL STORE #14775Brownfields · 0.6 mi
- DUTCH CUPBOARDUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- BERLIN PLUMBING COUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- OWENS-ILLINOIS PRESC. PROD.,INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- E. HOMES LOCAL SCHOOLSUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- BERLIN PENNZOILUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- YODER LUMBER CO., INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- HOLMES LIMESTONE CO. MACHINE SHOUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Berlin'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 Berlin.
Total Sites
195
within ~10 miles of Berlin
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
30 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Berlin
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Berlin
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Berlin, Toxics Release Inventory runs higher than the national average — 30 sites within ~10 miles of Berlin. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Berlin
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 Berlin average
Your land is one point inside Berlin
Everything above resolves to Berlin 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 Berlin Average
Berlin Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Berlin
- ●One soil character for all of Berlin
- ●Frost dates read at Berlin's scale: Apr 6 to Nov 8
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Berlin's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Berlin
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Berlin, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Berlin averages can't show:
We read public map data around Berlin — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Berlin average
How we know this about Berlin
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 Berlin’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 Berlin
When does frost risk typically end in Berlin?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Berlin typically lands around Apr 6, 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 27.
When is the first frost in Berlin?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Berlin typically arrives around Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 25, so the watching starts about Oct 9 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Berlin?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Berlin sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Apr 6 through Nov 8, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 27 to Oct 25, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Berlin?
The federal record around Berlin shows 195 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (106), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.2 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Berlin?
From about Oct 9 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 8 (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 8. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Berlin's scale — its 6a band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Berlin'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 Berlin’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Berlin's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 2,444 acres it covers and 195 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Berlin's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Berlin's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 6 and Nov 8 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 195 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Berlin, the closest Brownfields record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Berlin's boundary and the 2,444 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Berlin's own centroid, the Western Allegheny PlateauUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Berlin 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 Berlin's 2,444 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Holmes County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Holmes County
- The growing challenges every Ohio grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Ohio
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Holmes County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Berlin's 2,444 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Berlin you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 2,444 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 Berlin-wide figureread your own land →
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