Ford County, in Illinois, 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.
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.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Ford County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Ford County, so your frost dates and drainage aren't the county average. 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 Ford County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Ford County — the short answer
Ford County, Illinois: USDA zone 6a, about 201 days between hard freezes, across 311K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~201
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 311K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are county 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 Ford County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ford County's 201-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Ford County
Across a year, Ford County accumulates about 3,088 growing degree days above 50°F, about 295 fewer than the middle Illinois county — ahead of 29 of Illinois’s 102 counties. Degree days are the heat a crop actually gets to work with — more of them is more room to ripen a long-season crop before the freeze closes the window.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Ford County
Across Ford County, the ground is predominantly Mollisols, where Ashkum, Bryce, and Drummer are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a silty clay loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 6.2–6.8, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Mollisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
33%
Hydric soils
62%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Ford County
The USDA soil survey maps 61% of Ford County as poorly drained — but another 39% drains differently: 33% somewhat poorly drained, 3% moderately well drained.
Ashkum is the most extensive named soil at 15% of mapped acres, then Bryce (15%) and Drummer (10%).
Which of them your own lot sits on is a parcel question, not a county one. Check your address for the survey at your boundary.
What this means for growing in Ford County
Each reading below is measured for Ford County itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Drainage
MeasuredThe dominant soils across Ford County are poorly drained, in hydrologic group C/D — ground that sheds water slowly.
Beds can stay saturated for days after heavy rain, and the roots of most vegetables, berries, and fruit trees suffocate or rot in soil that never drains.
Raised beds or mounded rows lift roots above the wet zone; choose water-tolerant crops for the lowest spots.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Ford County runs about pH 6.2–6.8, close to neutral.
This is the range most vegetables prefer — one correction you probably do not have to make, which is genuinely good news for a new bed.
Keep it there with compost rather than lime or sulfur, and only amend if your own soil test says otherwise.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredFord County runs about 201 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
MeasuredFord County 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 Ford County is in
Ford County sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Ford County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Ford County's own USDA zone 6a and its own 201-day season between hard freezes, using the same matching engine that runs a full parcel report. These cleared both. Sun, soil pH and drainage vary lot by lot — those are the parcel questions below. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile.
Is it too late to plant in Ford County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 13; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 28 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. There is slack in a calendar like this — late plantings, second rounds of favorites, and a fall bench that keeps beds working.
Documented around Ford County
- Japanese beetle1 documented records
- monarch butterfly1 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Ford County
USGS estimates 242,563 lb of Glyphosate on Ford County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Acetochlor (108,574 lb) and Atrazine (92,373 lb).
Farmland across the whole county, not any one lot. Check your address for the site-by-site record.
Safe to Grow Here?
What the federal record shows across Ford County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Ford County — 138 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Ford County is a modest one — a typical footprint for a growing area. Nothing here calls for alarm; it's worth knowing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and each one on the map carries its type and location. If one turns out to be a near neighbor, a one-time soil test settles the question.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Ford County
Closest first, across Ford County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- GCMS MIDDLE SCHOOL DIST 5Brownfields · 2.1 mi
- Ag Service 11 IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Melvin SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Ford Grain Co IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Ford-Iroqouis Fs IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- FORD CENTRAL CUSD 8Brownfields · 2.4 mi
- Larry Samit ConstrUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- Roberts VortacUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- Ford Central C U S D 8Underground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- Lyman Township OfUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.6 mi
- Roberts Quick StopUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
- Ford County Highway DeptUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ford County'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 Ford County.
Total Sites
138
across Ford County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Ford County
Severity Distribution
across Ford County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Ford County, two things run higher than the national average across Ford County — CAFO (7 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (85 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Ford County
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 Ford County average
Your land is one point inside Ford County
Everything above resolves to Ford County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 311K 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 county 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 county average.
Your Lot vs the Ford County Average
Ford County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Ford County
- ●One soil character for all of Ford County
- ●Frost dates read at Ford County's scale: Apr 10 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ford County's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Ford County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ford County, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ford County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ford County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ford County average
How we know this about Ford County
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at county grain; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at this county’s own record where one resolves, and the labelled statewide window where none does; soils from the USDA NRCS SSURGO survey, area-weighted across the county’s own map units; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination and pesticide records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Where Ford County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Ford County
When does frost risk typically end in Ford County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ford County typically lands around Apr 10, 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 1.
How long is the growing season in Ford County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ford County sees about 201 frost-free days — roughly Apr 10 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 1 to Oct 14, about 166 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ford County?
The federal record around Ford County shows 138 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (85), the nearest Brownfields record about 2.1 miles out — a typical footprint for a growing area, and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. It's worth seeing which recorded sites sit closest to where you grow, and testing the soil before new food beds near any of them.
Everything above is measured at Ford County's scale — its 6a band and its 201-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ford County's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
Will It Grow Here?
Zone fit is the first question — each answer below reads Illinois's frost window, season length, and soil profile against the plant's real requirements.
What this page reads at Ford County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Ford County's own scale — its own ~201-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 138 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ford County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ford County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~201-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Ford CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 138 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Brownfields record about 2.1 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Ford County's boundary and the 310,782 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~201-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Ford County sitting wholly inside the Central Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Ford County for 2 tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Ford County farmland, and roughly how muchUSGS NAWQA EPest county estimates
Inherited from a wider read
- The growing challenges every Illinois grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Illinois
What this page can’t tell you
- How the season shifts across Ford County — the ~201 days above is one reading at its centre; the 12 towns below each carry their owntowns in this county →
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Ford County's 310,782 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 138 documented sites actually reaches your soil — that needs your address, the wind, and the groundwater directionhow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — none of it survives being averaged over Ford Countyread your own land →