Pope County, in Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Reliable performers under these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens; what your own ground favors still comes down to its soil, sun, and drainage.
Pope County lies within the Shawnee Hills / Southern Illinois (Little Egypt) — a regional growing area with its own character.
Grounded in USDA PHZM 2023 · Growable Ground suitability scoring · NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Pope County holds more than one microclimate.
Soils and elevations shift across Pope 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 Pope County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Pope County — the short answer
Pope County, Illinois: USDA zone 7a, about 220 days between hard freezes, across 236K acres.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- Days between freezes
- ~220
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F
- County area
- 236K 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 7a is Pope County's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Pope County's 220-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Heat and winter chill in Pope County
Across a year, Pope County accumulates about 4,029 growing degree days above 50°F, about 646 more than the middle Illinois county — ahead of 94 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.
Winter banks about 2,411 hours below 45°F. Chill is what tells a fruit tree its dormancy is over, and it is set by climate rather than by anything you can build.
Grounded in PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University — 1991–2020 monthly normals
Soil in Pope County
Across Pope County, the ground is predominantly Alfisols, where Grantsburg, Wellston, and Zanesville are the most extensive named soil series. The soil is generally moderately well drained with a silt loam surface. Topsoil pH runs about 5.1–5.8, strongly acidic. Rainfall drains through hydrologic group C soils.
Soil order
Alfisols
Drainage
Moderately well drained
Prime farmland
18%
Hydric soils
6%
Soil still varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
How the ground varies across Pope County
The USDA soil survey maps 56% of Pope County as moderately well drained — but another 42% drains differently: 31% well drained, 6% somewhat poorly drained.
Grantsburg is the most extensive named soil at 31% of mapped acres, then Wellston (13%) and Zanesville (12%).
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 Pope County
Each reading below is measured for Pope 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 Pope County are moderately well drained, in hydrologic group C — roughly the middle of the drainage range.
This is close to the middle most vegetables prefer: it holds enough water to carry a crop between rains without staying waterlogged. The catch is that a wet spring or a low corner can still tip it soggy.
Plant on the site as-is for most crops, but keep the lowest, slowest-draining beds for moisture-tolerant plantings.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Surface pH
MeasuredTopsoil across Pope County runs about pH 5.1–5.8, on the acidic side.
Blueberries, potatoes, and rhododendrons thrive in it, but most vegetables start locking out nutrients below about pH 6.0 and grow pale and stunted no matter how much you feed them.
A measured lime application raises pH for the crops that need it — but test first, because the right rate depends on your own soil, not the county average.
USDA NRCS SSURGO
Season length
MeasuredPope County runs about 220 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
MeasuredPope County sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a.
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 Pope County is in
Pope County spans 2 EPA Level III ecoregions — Interior Plateau (83%) and Interior River Valleys and Hills (17%). Which one your land falls in changes what grows wild there and how the ground behaves, and a county-wide answer cannot tell you which.
What Grows in Pope County
We scored all 1,086 plants against Pope County's own USDA zone 7a and its own 220-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 Pope County?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 29 (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. 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.
What gets applied to farmland in Pope County
USGS estimates 8,921 lb of Metolachlor & Metolachlor-s on Pope County farmland in 2019, its largest by weight, ahead of Metolachlor-s (6,532 lb) and Glyphosate (6,212 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 Pope County — and how to grow with it.
We checked the federal record across Pope County — 48 documented sites across 2 of the 9 source types we track.
The most significant on record: 30 mining sites. Historic and active mines that may leach heavy metals like arsenic, lead, and cadmium.
Pope County carries one of the heavier federal records we track — and that's not a verdict on your yard. Proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis: nothing here says any particular parcel is affected. It does earn one concrete step — before food beds go in the ground, a professional soil test tells you exactly what you're working with, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well almost anywhere in the meantime.
Sources: EPA, USGS — 1.8M documented sites tracked nationwide across 9 federal source types.
What's on the federal record near Pope County
Closest first, across Pope County. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Shawnee Medium Interest Fluorine DepositMining · 3.4 mi
- Richerson Oil Company - Bulk PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Golconda MarinaUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Fruit Belt Ser CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Richerson HomerUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
- Pittsburg MineMining · 3.9 mi
- Gas-N-Go 24-7Underground Storage Tanks · 4.5 mi
- Golconda Gas N GoUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.5 mi
- Thomas AntonacciUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
- Eddyville Administrative SiteUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
- Dixon Springs State ParkUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.8 mi
- Lock & Dam 51Underground Storage Tanks · 4.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Pope 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 Pope County.
Severity Distribution
across Pope County
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Pope County, Mining runs higher than the national average — 30 sites across Pope County. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Mining: Mining sites — both historic and active — can leach heavy metals (arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury) into soil and water for centuries after operations cease.
Test soil for heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury) — this is essential near any mining site.
Check your specific parcel in Pope 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 Pope County average
Your land is one point inside Pope County
Everything above resolves to Pope County as a whole — one PHZM band and one county frost record, read across 236K 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 Pope County Average
Pope County Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Pope County
- ●One soil character for all of Pope County
- ●Frost dates read at Pope County's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Pope County's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your parcel in Pope County
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Pope County, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Pope County averages can't show:
We read public map data around Pope County — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Pope County average
How we know this about Pope 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 Pope County carries no record of its own, the figure is inherited and labelled — the resolution ledger below names each.
Common questions about Pope County
When does frost risk typically end in Pope County?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Pope County typically lands around Mar 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 Apr 19.
How long is the growing season in Pope County?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Pope County sees about 220 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 21, about 185 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Pope County?
The federal record around Pope County runs heavier than most — 48 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (30), the nearest Mining record about 3.4 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.
Everything above is measured at Pope County's scale — its 7a band and its 220-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Pope 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 Pope County’s own scale
8 of the readings below were taken at Pope County's own scale — its own ~220-day span between 28°F freezes, the 3 most extensive soil series mapped here and 48 documented sites inside its boundary; one is borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Pope County's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Pope County's own 28°F hard-freeze dates and its ~220-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- The soil order, drainage, surface pH, and the 3 most extensive named soil series mapped in Pope CountyUSDA NRCS SSURGO
- 48 documented contamination sites inside the county boundary, distance-sorted from its center — the closest Mining record about 3.4 miles outFederal environmental registers
- Pope County's boundary and the 236,075 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~220-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The 2 ecoregions Pope County spans, Interior Plateau the largestUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Which agricultural compounds go onto Pope 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 Pope County — the ~220 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 Pope County's 236,075 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which of those 48 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 Pope Countyread your own land →