Golconda, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Golconda, 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 Golconda 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 Golconda — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Golconda — the short answer
Golconda, Illinois: USDA zone 7a, about 222 days between hard freezes, across 326 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 6
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~222
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 326 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 7a is Golconda's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Golconda's 222-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Golconda
Each reading below is measured for Golconda itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGolconda runs about 222 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
MeasuredGolconda 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 Golconda is in
Golconda sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Golconda's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Pope County is mostly Interior Plateau. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Golconda
Every plant below cleared Golconda's own zone 7a and its 222-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Golconda?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. 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 6 — 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 Golconda
Survey cells within 31 miles of Golconda checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 130 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Golconda
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Golconda. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Lock & Dam 51Underground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Pope County School Dist #1Underground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Anderson ChevroletUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Dixon Springs State ParkUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Golconda Civilian Conservation CUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Golconda Gas N GoUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- Gas-N-Go 24-7Underground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- Richerson HomerUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- Golconda MarinaUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- Richerson Oil Company - Bulk PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- Fruit Belt Ser CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.9 mi
- Joy GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Golconda'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 Golconda.
Total Sites
82
within ~10 miles of Golconda
Risk Level
High
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Golconda
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Golconda
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Golconda, Mining runs higher than the national average — 44 sites within ~10 miles of Golconda. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Golconda
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 Golconda average
Your land is one point inside Golconda
Everything above resolves to Golconda as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 326 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 Golconda Average
Golconda Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Golconda
- ●One soil character for all of Golconda
- ●Frost dates read at Golconda's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 6
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Golconda's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Golconda
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Golconda, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Golconda averages can't show:
We read public map data around Golconda — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Golconda average
How we know this about Golconda
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 Golconda’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 Golconda
When does frost risk typically end in Golconda?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Golconda 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.
When is the first frost in Golconda?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Golconda typically arrives around Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 23, so the watching starts about Oct 7 — about 222 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Golconda?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Golconda sees about 222 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 6, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 23, about 187 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Golconda?
The federal record around Golconda runs heavier than most — 82 documented sites, mostly Mining entries (44), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Golconda?
From about Oct 7 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 Nov 6 (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 Nov 6. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Golconda's scale — its 7a band and its 222-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Golconda'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 Golconda’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Golconda's own scale — its own ~222-day season between 28°F freezes, the 326 acres it covers and 82 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Golconda's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Golconda's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 29 and Nov 6 and the ~222-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 82 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Golconda, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Golconda's boundary and the 326 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~222-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Golconda sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Golconda checked, none carrying a detectionlydemapr (De Bona & Helmus), 10 km survey lattice
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Golconda's 326 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Pope County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Pope 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 Pope County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Golconda's 326 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Golconda you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 326 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Golconda-wide figureread your own land →