Ottawa Hills, Ohio, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Ottawa Hills, 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 Ottawa Hills 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 Ottawa Hills — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Ottawa Hills — the short answer
Ottawa Hills, Ohio: USDA zone 6b, about 215 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- 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 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~215
- 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 6b is Ottawa Hills's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ottawa Hills's 215-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ottawa Hills
Each reading below is measured for Ottawa Hills itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredOttawa Hills runs about 215 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
MeasuredOttawa Hills sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Ottawa Hills is in
Ottawa Hills sits in the Huron/Erie Lake Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ottawa Hills's own centroid rather than borrowed from Lucas County.
What Grows in Ottawa Hills
Every plant below cleared Ottawa Hills's own zone 6b and its 215-day season. Each card opens that plant's Ohio profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ottawa Hills?
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 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 7 — 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 Ottawa Hills
Spotted lanternfly documented 3 miles from Ottawa Hills, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ottawa Hills
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ottawa Hills. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SAINT URSULA ACADEMYBrownfields · 1600 ft
- VILLAGE MARATHON SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 1700 ft
- VILLAGE OF OTTAWA HILLSUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
- VILLAGE OF OTTAWA HILLSBrownfields · 2100 ft
- JENNITE CO.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- OTTAWA HILLS MEMORIAL PARKUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- LAWRENCE'S AUTO SERVICEUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- TRUE NORTH ENERGY LOCATION 510 *Brownfields · 0.7 mi
- TRUE NORTH # 510Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- ADARIS TESTING LABORATORYBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- SEAR'SBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- COSTCO WHOLESALE - TOLEDOBrownfields · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ottawa Hills'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 Ottawa Hills.
Total Sites
2,433
within ~10 miles of Ottawa Hills
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
54 Superfund sites
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ottawa Hills
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ottawa Hills
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Ottawa Hills, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Ottawa Hills — Superfund (54 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (171 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
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 Ottawa Hills
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 Ottawa Hills average
Your land is one point inside Ottawa Hills
Everything above resolves to Ottawa Hills 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 Ottawa Hills Average
Ottawa Hills Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Ottawa Hills
- ●One soil character for all of Ottawa Hills
- ●Frost dates read at Ottawa Hills's scale: Apr 6 to Nov 7
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ottawa Hills's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ottawa Hills
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ottawa Hills, Ohio — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ottawa Hills averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ottawa Hills — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ottawa Hills average
How we know this about Ottawa Hills
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 Ottawa Hills’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 Ottawa Hills
When does frost risk typically end in Ottawa Hills?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ottawa Hills 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 Ottawa Hills?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ottawa Hills typically arrives around Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 24, so the watching starts about Oct 8 — about 215 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ottawa Hills?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ottawa Hills sees about 215 frost-free days — roughly Apr 6 through Nov 7, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 27 to Oct 24, about 180 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ottawa Hills?
The federal record around Ottawa Hills is a meaningful one — 2,433 documented sites, mostly Brownfields entries (1,058), the nearest Brownfields 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 Ottawa Hills?
From about Oct 8 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 7 (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 7. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ottawa Hills's scale — its 6b band and its 215-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ottawa Hills'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 Ottawa Hills’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ottawa Hills's own scale — its own ~215-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,204 acres it covers and 2,433 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ottawa Hills's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ottawa Hills's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 6 and Nov 7 and the ~215-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 2,433 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ottawa Hills, the closest Brownfields record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ottawa Hills's boundary and the 1,204 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~215-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ottawa Hills's own centroid, the Huron/Erie Lake PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Ottawa Hillslydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Ottawa Hills's 1,204 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Lucas County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Lucas 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 Lucas County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Ottawa Hills's 1,204 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ottawa Hills you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,204 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Ottawa Hills-wide figureread your own land →
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