Elmwood, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Growers here do well with cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens — with the usual caveat that any single yard's soil, sun, and drainage cast the deciding vote.
Even in Elmwood, 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 Elmwood 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 Elmwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Elmwood — the short answer
Elmwood, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 204 days between hard freezes, across 893 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~204
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 893 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 Elmwood's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Elmwood's 204-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Elmwood
Each reading below is measured for Elmwood itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredElmwood runs about 204 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
MeasuredElmwood 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 Elmwood is in
Elmwood sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Elmwood's own centroid rather than borrowed from Peoria County.
What Grows in Elmwood
Every plant below cleared Elmwood's own zone 5b and its 204-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Elmwood?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 29 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Elmwood
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Elmwood. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Croziers Standard StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 850 ft
- County Line Veterinary SerUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- Shissler Seed Co IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- Jordan's Service Center, LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- Elmwood Comm Unit Sch Dist 322Underground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- Hall David WUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- Elmwood City OfUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- Elmwood Elevator CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- Elmwood TownshipUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- Elmwood Township ShedUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- Blunier Concrete CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- Don Hurst & Son Farm Impr IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Elmwood'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 Elmwood.
Total Sites
88
within ~10 miles of Elmwood
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
1 Toxics Release Inventory facility
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Elmwood
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Elmwood
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Elmwood, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 67 sites within ~10 miles of Elmwood. It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
Underground Storage Tanks: Underground storage tanks are the single most common source of soil contamination near homes and gardens.
Use raised beds with imported soil — this eliminates the primary soil-contact pathway.
Check your specific parcel in Elmwood
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 Elmwood average
Your land is one point inside Elmwood
Everything above resolves to Elmwood as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 893 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 city 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 Elmwood Average
Elmwood Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Elmwood
- ●One soil character for all of Elmwood
- ●Frost dates read at Elmwood's scale: Apr 8 to Oct 29
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Elmwood's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Elmwood
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Elmwood, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Elmwood averages can't show:
We read public map data around Elmwood — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Elmwood average
How we know this about Elmwood
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Elmwood’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Elmwood
When does frost risk typically end in Elmwood?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Elmwood typically lands around Apr 8, 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 29.
When is the first frost in Elmwood?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Elmwood typically arrives around Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 15, so the watching starts about Sep 29 — about 204 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Elmwood?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Elmwood sees about 204 frost-free days — roughly Apr 8 through Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 29 to Oct 15, about 169 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Elmwood?
The federal record around Elmwood shows 88 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (67), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Elmwood?
From about Sep 29 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 29 (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 29. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Elmwood's scale — its 5b band and its 204-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Elmwood'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 Elmwood’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Elmwood's own scale — its own ~204-day season between 28°F freezes, the 893 acres it covers and 88 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Elmwood's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Elmwood's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 8 and Oct 29 and the ~204-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 88 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Elmwood, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Elmwood's boundary and the 893 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~204-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Elmwood's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Elmwood's 893 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Peoria County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Peoria 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 Peoria County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Elmwood's 893 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Elmwood you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 893 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.2 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 Elmwood-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisElmwood sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides