Port Edwards, Wisconsin, sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
The conditions favor cabbage, cranberry, turkish rocket, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Port Edwards, 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 Port Edwards 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 Port Edwards — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Port Edwards — the short answer
Port Edwards, Wisconsin: USDA zone 4b, about 166 days between hard freezes, across 4K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 4b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~166
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 4K 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 4b is Port Edwards's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Port Edwards's 166-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Port Edwards
Each reading below is measured for Port Edwards itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPort Edwards runs about 166 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
MeasuredPort Edwards sits in USDA hardiness zone 4b.
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 Port Edwards is in
Port Edwards sits in the North Central Hardwood Forests — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Port Edwards's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wood County.
What Grows in Port Edwards
Every plant below cleared Port Edwards's own zone 4b and its 166-day season. Each card opens that plant's Wisconsin profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Port Edwards?
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 Apr 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 29 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 12 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Port Edwards
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Port Edwards. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- WOOD COUNTY AIRPORTUnderground Storage Tanks · 1800 ft
- WOLOSEK & SONS INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- Bulls Eye Country ClubUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- JAMES BRUENER TIMBER PROD INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- WD-22/06E/30-0053Nitrate · 0.9 mi
- Alexander FieldUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Erco WorldwideUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Flying Dollar Air IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- CURRENT TECHNOLOGIES INCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- NEKOOSA PORT EDWARDS STATE BANKUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- Nepco Lake Pumping StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- WIS POWER & LIGHT COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Port Edwards'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 Port Edwards.
Total Sites
569
within ~10 miles of Port Edwards
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
21 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Port Edwards
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Port Edwards
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
Check your specific parcel in Port Edwards
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 Port Edwards average
Your land is one point inside Port Edwards
Everything above resolves to Port Edwards as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 4K 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 Port Edwards Average
Port Edwards Average
- ●USDA Zones 4b, averaged across Port Edwards
- ●One soil character for all of Port Edwards
- ●Frost dates read at Port Edwards's scale: Apr 29 to Oct 12
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Port Edwards's 4b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Port Edwards
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Port Edwards, Wisconsin — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Port Edwards averages can't show:
We read public map data around Port Edwards — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Port Edwards average
How we know this about Port Edwards
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 Port Edwards’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 Port Edwards
When does frost risk typically end in Port Edwards?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Port Edwards typically lands around Apr 29, 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 20.
When is the first frost in Port Edwards?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Port Edwards typically arrives around Oct 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Sep 28, so the watching starts about Sep 12 — about 166 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Port Edwards?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Port Edwards sees about 166 frost-free days — roughly Apr 29 through Oct 12, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 20 to Sep 28, about 131 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Port Edwards?
The federal record around Port Edwards is a meaningful one — 569 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (309), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Port Edwards?
From about Sep 12 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 12 (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 12. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Port Edwards's scale — its 4b band and its 166-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Port Edwards'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 Port Edwards’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Port Edwards's own scale — its own ~166-day season between 28°F freezes, the 3,827 acres it covers and 569 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Port Edwards's own USDA hardiness band, zones 4bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Port Edwards's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 29 and Oct 12 and the ~166-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 569 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Port Edwards, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Port Edwards's boundary and the 3,827 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 4b and a ~166-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Port Edwards's own centroid, the North Central Hardwood ForestsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Port Edwards's 3,827 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wood County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wood County
- The growing challenges every Wisconsin grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Wisconsin
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Wood County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Port Edwards's 3,827 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Port Edwards you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 3,827 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks 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 Port Edwards-wide figureread your own land →