Gridley, 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.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, blueberry, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Gridley, 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 Gridley 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 Gridley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Gridley — the short answer
Gridley, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 205 days between hard freezes, across 789 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 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~205
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 789 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 Gridley's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Gridley's 205-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Gridley
Each reading below is measured for Gridley itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredGridley runs about 205 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
MeasuredGridley 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 Gridley is in
Gridley sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Gridley's own centroid rather than borrowed from McLean County.
What Grows in Gridley
Every plant below cleared Gridley's own zone 5b and its 205-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Gridley?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. 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 31 — 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's on the federal record near Gridley
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Gridley. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- MCI Gridley Il JunctionUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- RINGGER FEEDS, INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 950 ft
- RINGGER FOODS INCBrownfields · 1000 ft
- GRIDLEY CUSD #10 HIGH SCHOOLBrownfields · 1100 ft
- Gridey School Dist 10Underground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- Kevin yergler PropertyUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Environmental Properties RehabilitationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- NICOR GAS LAKE BLOOMINGTON STORAGE SITE (STA 40)Brownfields · 1500 ft
- Gridley Minit Mart #629Underground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Gridley Township OfUnderground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- HCC, INC.Brownfields · 1900 ft
- Agri-CoversUnderground Storage Tanks · 2000 ft
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Gridley'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 Gridley.
Total Sites
110
within ~10 miles of Gridley
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
3 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Gridley
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Gridley
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Gridley, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Gridley — CAFO (6 sites) and Underground Storage Tanks (74 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 Gridley
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 Gridley average
Your land is one point inside Gridley
Everything above resolves to Gridley as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 789 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 Gridley Average
Gridley Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Gridley
- ●One soil character for all of Gridley
- ●Frost dates read at Gridley's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 31
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Gridley's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Gridley
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Gridley, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Gridley averages can't show:
We read public map data around Gridley — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Gridley average
How we know this about Gridley
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 Gridley’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 Gridley
When does frost risk typically end in Gridley?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Gridley 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 Gridley?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Gridley typically arrives around Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 17, so the watching starts about Oct 1 — about 205 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Gridley?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Gridley sees about 205 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 31, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 17, about 170 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Gridley?
The federal record around Gridley shows 110 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (74), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile 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 Gridley?
From about Oct 1 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 31 (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 31. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Gridley's scale — its 5b band and its 205-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Gridley'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 Gridley’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Gridley's own scale — its own ~205-day season between 28°F freezes, the 789 acres it covers and 110 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Gridley's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Gridley's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 31 and the ~205-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 110 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Gridley, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Gridley's boundary and the 789 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~205-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Gridley'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 Gridley's 789 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom McLean County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom McLean 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 McLean County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Gridley's 789 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Gridley you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 789 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 Gridley-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisGridley sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.