Jasper County, in Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Jasper County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Jasper 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 Jasper County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Jasper County — the short answer
Jasper County, Illinois: USDA zone 6b, about 218 days between hard freezes, across 317K acres.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~218
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 317K 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 6b is Jasper County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Jasper County's 218-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat in Jasper County
Across a year, Jasper County accumulates about 3,685 growing degree days above 50°F, about 302 more than the middle Illinois county — ahead of 68 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 Jasper County
Across Jasper County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Cisne, Bluford, and Hoyleton are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally poorly drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.8–6.6, slightly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C/D soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Poorly drained
Prime farmland
14%
Hydric soils
45%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Jasper County
The USDA soil survey maps 44% of Jasper County as poorly drained — but another 55% drains differently: 36% somewhat poorly drained, 12% well drained.
Cisne is the most extensive named soil at 26% of mapped acres, then Bluford (12%) and Hoyleton (9%).
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 Jasper County
Each reading below is measured for Jasper 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 Jasper 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 Jasper County runs about pH 5.8–6.6, 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
MeasuredJasper County runs about 218 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
MeasuredJasper County 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 Jasper County is in
Jasper County sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. One consistent ecological setting across the whole county.
What Grows in Jasper County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Jasper County's own USDA zone 6b and its own 218-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 Jasper County?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 4 — 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 Jasper County
- monarch butterfly23 documented records
Sighting records, so they follow observers as much as insects.
What gets applied to farmland in Jasper County
USGS estimates 220,771 lb of Glyphosate on Jasper County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Atrazine (97,897 lb) and Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s (86,009 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 Jasper County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Jasper County — 81 documented sites across 6 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities. Active industrial facilities reporting chemical releases to air, water, and land.
The federal record across Jasper 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 Jasper County
Closest first, across Jasper County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Eagle Quick LubeUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.5 mi
- Jasper County Hwy DeptUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- Parks And CemetariesUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.8 mi
- EVAPCO INCBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- EVAPCO INCToxics Release Inventory · 0.9 mi
- Newton City OfUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.9 mi
- CITY OF NEWTONBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- Wade Township GarageUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- NEWTON COMMUNITY HSBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- REX VAULT & MAUSOLEUM SERVICE INCBrownfields · 1.0 mi
- Dufrain ImplementUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
- Newton Petroelum, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Jasper 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 Jasper County.
Total Sites
81
across Jasper County
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
5 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
across Jasper County
Severity Distribution
across Jasper County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Jasper County, two things run higher than the national average across Jasper County — CAFO (4 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (51 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Jasper 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 Jasper County average
Your land is one point inside Jasper County
Everything above resolves to Jasper County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 317K 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 Jasper County Average
Jasper County Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Jasper County
- ●One soil character for all of Jasper County
- ●Frost dates read at Jasper County's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Jasper County's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Jasper County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Jasper County, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Jasper County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Jasper County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Jasper County average
How we know this about Jasper 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 Jasper County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Jasper County
When does frost risk typically end in Jasper County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Jasper County typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
How long is the growing season in Jasper County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Jasper County sees about 218 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Oct 21, about 183 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Jasper County?
The federal record around Jasper County shows 81 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (51), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 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 Jasper County's scale — its 6b band and its 218-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Jasper 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 Jasper County’s own scale
9 of the readings below were taken at Jasper County's own scale — its own ~218-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 81 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Jasper County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Jasper County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~218-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Jasper CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 81 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.5 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Jasper County's boundary and the 316,552 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~218-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Jasper County sitting wholly inside the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Open occurrence records documented in Jasper County for a tracked speciesGBIF derived datasets (CC0 / CC BY 4.0)
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Jasper 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 Jasper County — the ~218 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 Jasper County's 316,552 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 81 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 Jasper Countyread your own land →