Junction, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
Expect cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Junction, 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 Junction 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 Junction — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Junction — the short answer
Junction, Illinois: USDA zone 7a, about 227 days between hard freezes, across 529 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 27
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~227
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 529 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 Junction's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Junction's 227-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Junction
Each reading below is measured for Junction itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredJunction runs about 227 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
MeasuredJunction 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 Junction is in
Junction sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Junction's own centroid rather than borrowed from Gallatin County.
What Grows in Junction
Every plant below cleared Junction's own zone 7a and its 227-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Junction?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Feb 27; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 27 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 9 — 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.
Documented around Junction
Survey cells within 31 miles of Junction checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 138 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Junction
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Junction. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- First Bank TrUnderground Storage Tanks · 500 ft
- Claytons Ser StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 1400 ft
- 9S9E-17.2h1Nitrate · 1.6 mi
- LAZY J CATTLECAFO · 1.7 mi
- Galt Steve J.Underground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- Scates Service StationUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
- Shawnee Quickmart #2Underground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Porter Bros FertilizerUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Eagle Valley IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Dowen Bros Transports IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- Shawnee Quick Mart #1Underground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
- Eagle MineUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.8 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Junction'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 Junction.
Total Sites
72
within ~10 miles of Junction
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Junction
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Junction
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Junction, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 52 sites within ~10 miles of Junction. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
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 Junction
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 Junction average
Your land is one point inside Junction
Everything above resolves to Junction as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 529 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 Junction Average
Junction Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Junction
- ●One soil character for all of Junction
- ●Frost dates read at Junction's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 9
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Junction's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Junction
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Junction, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Junction averages can't show:
We read public map data around Junction — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Junction average
How we know this about Junction
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 Junction’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 Junction
When does frost risk typically end in Junction?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Junction typically lands around Mar 27, 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 17.
When is the first frost in Junction?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Junction typically arrives around Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 26, so the watching starts about Oct 10 — about 227 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Junction?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Junction sees about 227 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 9, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 26, about 192 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Junction?
The federal record around Junction shows 72 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (52), 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 Junction?
From about Oct 10 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 9 (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 9. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Junction's scale — its 7a band and its 227-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Junction'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 Junction’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Junction's own scale — its own ~227-day season between 28°F freezes, the 529 acres it covers and 72 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Junction's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Junction's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 9 and the ~227-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 72 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Junction, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Junction's boundary and the 529 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~227-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Junction's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Junction 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 Junction's 529 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Gallatin County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Gallatin 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 Gallatin County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Junction's 529 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Junction you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 529 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 Junction-wide figureread your own land →