New Middletown, Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
The conditions favor cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in New Middletown, 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 New Middletown 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 New Middletown — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
New Middletown — the short answer
New Middletown, Ohio: USDA zone 6a, about 188 days between hard freezes, across 559 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 21
- 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
- ~188
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 559 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 New Middletown's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against New Middletown's 188-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in New Middletown
Each reading below is measured for New Middletown itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNew Middletown runs about 188 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
MeasuredNew Middletown 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 New Middletown is in
New Middletown sits in the Erie Drift Plain — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at New Middletown's own centroid rather than borrowed from Mahoning County.
What Grows in New Middletown
Every plant below cleared New Middletown's own zone 6a and its 188-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in New Middletown?
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 24; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 21 (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. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
Documented around New Middletown
Spotted lanternfly documented 5 miles from New Middletown, first recorded 2020. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near New Middletown
Closest first, within ~10 miles of New Middletown. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- VILLAGE OF NEW MIDDLETOWNUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- NEW MIDDLETOWN SHELLUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- JIMS AUTO BODYUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- LYDEN LOCATION 1111 *Brownfields · 1200 ft
- OHIO TURNPIKE COMMISSIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1200 ft
- NEW MIDDLETOWN SUNOCOUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- MARATHON #3773Underground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- DOLLAR GENERAL STORE #1877Brownfields · 2000 ft
- KWIK FILLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- TIC TOC FOOD MARTUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- SPRINGFIELD HIGH SCHOOLUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- WIZARD AIRBRUSH GRAPHICSBrownfields · 1.1 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from New Middletown'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 New Middletown.
Total Sites
661
within ~10 miles of New Middletown
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
9 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of New Middletown
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of New Middletown
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around New Middletown, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of New Middletown — Superfund (9 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (44 sites). Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in New Middletown
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 New Middletown average
Your land is one point inside New Middletown
Everything above resolves to New Middletown as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 559 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 New Middletown Average
New Middletown Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across New Middletown
- ●One soil character for all of New Middletown
- ●Frost dates read at New Middletown's scale: Apr 21 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not New Middletown's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in New Middletown
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in New Middletown, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that New Middletown averages can't show:
We read public map data around New Middletown — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the New Middletown average
How we know this about New Middletown
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 New Middletown’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 New Middletown
When does frost risk typically end in New Middletown?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in New Middletown typically lands around Apr 21, 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 12.
When is the first frost in New Middletown?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in New Middletown 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 188 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in New Middletown?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, New Middletown sees about 188 frost-free days — roughly Apr 21 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 12 to Oct 12, about 153 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in New Middletown?
The federal record around New Middletown is a meaningful one — 661 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (342), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 New Middletown?
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 New Middletown's scale — its 6a band and its 188-day season. Your yard writes its own version of New Middletown'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 New Middletown’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at New Middletown's own scale — its own ~188-day season between 28°F freezes, the 559 acres it covers and 661 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- New Middletown's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- New Middletown's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 21 and Oct 26 and the ~188-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 661 documented contamination sites on the federal record near New Middletown, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- New Middletown's boundary and the 559 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~188-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at New Middletown's own centroid, the Erie Drift PlainUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of New Middletownlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so New Middletown's 559 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Mahoning County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Mahoning 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 Mahoning County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among New Middletown's 559 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of New Middletown you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 559 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 New Middletown-wide figureread your own land →