De Pue, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in De Pue, 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 De Pue 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 De Pue — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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De Pue — the short answer
De Pue, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 200 days between hard freezes, across 2K acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 26
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~200
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 2K 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 De Pue's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against De Pue's 200-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in De Pue
Each reading below is measured for De Pue itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredDe Pue runs about 200 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
MeasuredDe Pue 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 De Pue is in
De Pue sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at De Pue's own centroid rather than borrowed from Bureau County.
What Grows in De Pue
Every plant below cleared De Pue's own zone 5b and its 200-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in De Pue?
For most of the year, no — what changes is which crops still fit the days remaining. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 26 — 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.
What's on the federal record near De Pue
Closest first, within ~10 miles of De Pue. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- DEPUE/NEW JERSEY ZINC/MOBIL CHEMICAL CORP.Superfund · 650 ft
- DEPUE/NEW JERSEY ZINC/MOBIL CHEMICAL CORP.Toxics Release Inventory · 700 ft
- Idoc Clinton LakeUnderground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- Casey's General Store #1349Underground Storage Tanks · 2100 ft
- ZINC CORPORATION OF AMERICAToxics Release Inventory · 2200 ft
- Mobil Mining & Minerals CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- Depue Boiler & Tank IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2500 ft
- ROSEHILL DEPUE PROPERTY SITESuperfund · 2600 ft
- New Jersey Zinc Depue PlantMining · 0.5 mi
- DONNELLY DEPUE STATE WILDLIFEBrownfields · 0.6 mi
- Depue PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 0.6 mi
- HENNEPIN POWER STATIONBrownfields · 1.9 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from De Pue'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 De Pue.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of De Pue
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of De Pue
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around De Pue, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of De Pue — Superfund (7 sites) and PFAS (4 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in De Pue
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 De Pue average
Your land is one point inside De Pue
Everything above resolves to De Pue as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 2K 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 De Pue Average
De Pue Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across De Pue
- ●One soil character for all of De Pue
- ●Frost dates read at De Pue's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 26
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not De Pue's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in De Pue
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in De Pue, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that De Pue averages can't show:
We read public map data around De Pue — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the De Pue average
How we know this about De Pue
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 De Pue’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 De Pue
When does frost risk typically end in De Pue?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in De Pue typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
When is the first frost in De Pue?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in De Pue typically arrives around Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 12, so the watching starts about Sep 26 — about 200 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in De Pue?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, De Pue sees about 200 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 26, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 12, about 165 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in De Pue?
The federal record around De Pue is a meaningful one — 335 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (190), the nearest Superfund record about 0.1 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 De Pue?
From about Sep 26 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 26 (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 26. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at De Pue's scale — its 5b band and its 200-day season. Your yard writes its own version of De Pue'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 De Pue’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at De Pue's own scale — its own ~200-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,566 acres it covers and 335 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- De Pue's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- De Pue's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 26 and the ~200-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 335 documented contamination sites on the federal record near De Pue, the closest Superfund record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- De Pue's boundary and the 1,566 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~200-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at De Pue's own centroid, the Central Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so De Pue's 1,566 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Bureau County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Bureau 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 Bureau County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among De Pue's 1,566 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of De Pue you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,566 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund 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 De Pue-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisDe Pue sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides