Carey, Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Carey, 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 Carey 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 Carey — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Carey — the short answer
Carey, Ohio: USDA zone 6a, about 207 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~207
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town 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 6a is Carey's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Carey's 207-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Carey
Each reading below is measured for Carey itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCarey runs about 207 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
MeasuredCarey 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 Carey is in
Carey sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Carey's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wyandot County.
What Grows in Carey
Every plant below cleared Carey's own zone 6a and its 207-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Carey?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 15; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 12 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Carey
Survey cells within 31 miles of Carey checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 43 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Carey
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Carey. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ORPHANED TANK IN RIGHT OF WAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- CAREY VILLAGEPFAS · 2200 ft
- DOLLAR GENERAL STORE #183Brownfields · 2300 ft
- MINERAL PROCESSING (0388000025)Toxics Release Inventory · 2500 ft
- MARATHON #2647Underground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- ABN TANKUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- COACH LIGHT INNUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- TOLEDO MOLDING & DIE, INC.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- RIGHT OF WAY (ORPHANED TANK)Underground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- ORPHANUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- LANNING MOTOR SALES INCBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- VILLAGE OF CAREYUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Carey'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 Carey.
Total Sites
112
within ~10 miles of Carey
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
3 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Carey
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Carey
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Carey, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Carey — Toxics Release Inventory (16 sites) and Superfund (3 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check your specific parcel in Carey
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 Carey average
Your land is one point inside Carey
Everything above resolves to Carey 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 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 Carey Average
Carey Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Carey
- ●One soil character for all of Carey
- ●Frost dates read at Carey's scale: Apr 12 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Carey's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Carey
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Carey, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Carey averages can't show:
We read public map data around Carey — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Carey average
How we know this about Carey
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 Carey’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 Carey
When does frost risk typically end in Carey?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Carey typically lands around Apr 12, 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 3.
When is the first frost in Carey?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Carey typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 207 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Carey?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Carey sees about 207 frost-free days — roughly Apr 12 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 3 to Oct 22, about 172 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Carey?
The federal record around Carey is a meaningful one — 112 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (63), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Carey?
From about Oct 6 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 5 (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 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Carey's scale — its 6a band and its 207-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Carey'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 Carey’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Carey's own scale — its own ~207-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,382 acres it covers and 112 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Carey's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Carey's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 12 and Nov 5 and the ~207-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 112 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Carey, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Carey's boundary and the 1,382 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~207-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Carey's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Carey 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 Carey's 1,382 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wyandot County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wyandot 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 Wyandot County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Carey's 1,382 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Carey you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,382 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.4 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 Carey-wide figureread your own land →
More in Ohio
Wider growing context
What grows across OhioCarey sits outside our named growing regions, so Ohio as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides