Carpentersville, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
The conditions favor cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Carpentersville, 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 Carpentersville 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 Carpentersville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Carpentersville — the short answer
Carpentersville, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 196 days between hard freezes, across 5K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 12
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 25
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~196
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 5K 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 5b is Carpentersville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Carpentersville's 196-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Carpentersville
Each reading below is measured for Carpentersville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredCarpentersville runs about 196 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
MeasuredCarpentersville sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Carpentersville is in
Carpentersville sits in the Southeastern Wisconsin Till Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Carpentersville's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Kane County is mostly Central Corn Belt Plains. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Carpentersville
Every plant below cleared Carpentersville's own zone 5b and its 196-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Carpentersville?
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 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 Oct 25 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Late in the year the fall bench takes over — quick greens, radishes, and garlic that repays you next summer.
Documented around Carpentersville
Spotted lanternfly documented 16 miles from Carpentersville, first recorded 2023. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Carpentersville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Carpentersville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ARENS CONTROLS CO LLCBrownfields · 700 ft
- CANCONEX INCBrownfields · 1200 ft
- EASTMAN CARPENTERSVILLE PLANTBrownfields · 2100 ft
- EASTMAN CARPENTERSVILLE PLANTToxics Release Inventory · 2100 ft
- VALSPAR CORPToxics Release Inventory · 2300 ft
- HEXION SPECIALTY CHEMICALS, INC.Brownfields · 2300 ft
- JAMES DAY PAINTSSuperfund · 2300 ft
- POLYNT COMPOSITES USA, INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 2300 ft
- I PULLOMA PAINTS/JAMES B DAY & COToxics Release Inventory · 2500 ft
- I PULLOMA PAINTS/JAMES B DAY & COBrownfields · 2500 ft
- Polynt Composites USA,Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 2600 ft
- I. Pulloma / James B. Day CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Carpentersville'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 Carpentersville.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Carpentersville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Carpentersville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Carpentersville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Carpentersville — PFAS (15 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (112 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Carpentersville
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 Carpentersville average
Your land is one point inside Carpentersville
Everything above resolves to Carpentersville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 5K 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 Carpentersville Average
Carpentersville Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Carpentersville
- ●One soil character for all of Carpentersville
- ●Frost dates read at Carpentersville's scale: Apr 12 to Oct 25
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Carpentersville's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Carpentersville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Carpentersville, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Carpentersville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Carpentersville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Carpentersville average
How we know this about Carpentersville
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 Carpentersville’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 Carpentersville
When does frost risk typically end in Carpentersville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Carpentersville 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 Carpentersville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Carpentersville typically arrives around Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 11, so the watching starts about Sep 25 — about 196 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Carpentersville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Carpentersville sees about 196 frost-free days — roughly Apr 12 through Oct 25, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 3 to Oct 11, about 161 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Carpentersville?
The federal record around Carpentersville runs heavier than most — 1,539 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (697), the nearest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Carpentersville?
From about Sep 25 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 25 (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 25. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Carpentersville's scale — its 5b band and its 196-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Carpentersville'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 Carpentersville’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Carpentersville's own scale — its own ~196-day season between 28°F freezes, the 5,034 acres it covers and 1,539 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Carpentersville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Carpentersville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 12 and Oct 25 and the ~196-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 1,539 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Carpentersville, the closest Brownfields record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Carpentersville's boundary and the 5,034 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~196-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Carpentersville sits in the Southeastern Wisconsin Till Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- A documented spotted-lanternfly record within reach of Carpentersvillelydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Carpentersville's 5,034 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Kane County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Kane County
- The growing challenges every Illinois grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Illinois
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Kane County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Carpentersville's 5,034 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Carpentersville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 5,034 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields 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 Carpentersville-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisCarpentersville sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides