Johnsonville, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
On paper, cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Johnsonville, 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 Johnsonville 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 Johnsonville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Johnsonville — the short answer
Johnsonville, Illinois: USDA zone 6b, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 136 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 31
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 136 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 6b is Johnsonville's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Johnsonville's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Johnsonville
Each reading below is measured for Johnsonville itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredJohnsonville runs about 219 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
MeasuredJohnsonville sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
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 Johnsonville is in
Johnsonville sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Johnsonville's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wayne County.
What Grows in Johnsonville
Every plant below cleared Johnsonville's own zone 6b and its 219-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Johnsonville?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 3; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 31 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — 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 Johnsonville
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Johnsonville. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- C & G GroceryUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- Johnsonville Elementary SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- Truckline Gas CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- Sam Dale Lake Conservation AreaUnderground Storage Tanks · 700 ft
- TRUNKLINE GAS COMPANYBrownfields · 2.4 mi
- SAM DALE LAKE CONSERVATIONBrownfields · 3.0 mi
- MARATHON PIPE LINE LLCBrownfields · 3.2 mi
- 2 miles NW of CisneNitrate · 4.2 mi
- GMO FARMSCAFO · 4.9 mi
- Bus BarnUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.5 mi
- Herb Bruce TruckingUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.5 mi
- Cisne OfficeUnderground Storage Tanks · 5.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Johnsonville'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 Johnsonville.
Total Sites
46
within ~10 miles of Johnsonville
Risk Level
Low
Highest-severity
3 concentrated animal feeding operations
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Johnsonville
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Johnsonville
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Johnsonville, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Johnsonville — PFAS (3 sites) and CAFO (3 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check your specific parcel in Johnsonville
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 Johnsonville average
Your land is one point inside Johnsonville
Everything above resolves to Johnsonville as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 136 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 Johnsonville Average
Johnsonville Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Johnsonville
- ●One soil character for all of Johnsonville
- ●Frost dates read at Johnsonville's scale: Mar 31 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Johnsonville's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Johnsonville
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Johnsonville, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Johnsonville averages can't show:
We read public map data around Johnsonville — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Johnsonville average
How we know this about Johnsonville
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 Johnsonville’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 Johnsonville
When does frost risk typically end in Johnsonville?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Johnsonville typically lands around Mar 31, 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 21.
When is the first frost in Johnsonville?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Johnsonville typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Johnsonville?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Johnsonville sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Mar 31 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 21 to Oct 22, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Johnsonville?
The federal record around Johnsonville is light — 46 documented sites across the 9 federal source types we checked, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (23), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out — and proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard. Growing food here starts from a strong position; a soil test before new food beds settles any site-specific question.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Johnsonville?
From about Oct 6 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 5 (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 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Johnsonville's scale — its 6b band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Johnsonville'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 Johnsonville’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Johnsonville's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 136 acres it covers and 46 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Johnsonville's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Johnsonville's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 31 and Nov 5 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 46 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Johnsonville, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Johnsonville's boundary and the 136 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Johnsonville'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 Johnsonville's 136 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wayne County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wayne 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 Wayne County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Johnsonville's 136 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Johnsonville you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 136 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 Johnsonville-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisJohnsonville sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides