Keensburg, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — enough range to grow cool-season vegetables, hardy fruit, and warm-season crops that mature before the first hard frost.
A short list that earns its place here — cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — with any one site's soil, sun, and drainage making the final cut.
Even in Keensburg, 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 Keensburg 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 Keensburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Keensburg — the short answer
Keensburg, Illinois: USDA zone 6b, about 223 days between hard freezes, across 166 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- 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 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~223
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 166 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 Keensburg's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Keensburg's 223-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Keensburg
Each reading below is measured for Keensburg itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredKeensburg runs about 223 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
MeasuredKeensburg 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 Keensburg is in
Keensburg sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Keensburg's own centroid rather than borrowed from Wabash County.
What Grows in Keensburg
Every plant below cleared Keensburg's own zone 6b and its 223-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Keensburg?
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 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 5 — 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 Keensburg
Survey cells within 31 miles of Keensburg checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 160 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Keensburg
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Keensburg. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Donald W. KennardUnderground Storage Tanks · 150 ft
- Amax Wabash MineUnderground Storage Tanks · 300 ft
- Tanks On Street Right Of WayUnderground Storage Tanks · 450 ft
- Rosignal Marathon ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- WABASH MINEBrownfields · 1.2 mi
- Sparton Petroleum CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- Hutson Co IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- M & S Cementing CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.6 mi
- BEALL WOODS STATE PARKBrownfields · 1.8 mi
- Bellmont Convenience StoreUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.1 mi
- Lewis Hering Elevator CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.3 mi
- D&M Dunns 66Underground Storage Tanks · 3.4 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Keensburg'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 Keensburg.
Total Sites
134
within ~10 miles of Keensburg
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
4 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Keensburg
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Keensburg
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Keensburg, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 107 sites within ~10 miles of Keensburg. That's not a problem with your land — it's information about 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 Keensburg
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 Keensburg average
Your land is one point inside Keensburg
Everything above resolves to Keensburg as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 166 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 Keensburg Average
Keensburg Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Keensburg
- ●One soil character for all of Keensburg
- ●Frost dates read at Keensburg's scale: Mar 27 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Keensburg's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Keensburg
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Keensburg, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Keensburg averages can't show:
We read public map data around Keensburg — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Keensburg average
How we know this about Keensburg
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 Keensburg’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 Keensburg
When does frost risk typically end in Keensburg?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Keensburg 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 Keensburg?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Keensburg 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 223 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Keensburg?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Keensburg sees about 223 frost-free days — roughly Mar 27 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 17 to Oct 22, about 188 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Keensburg?
The federal record around Keensburg shows 134 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (107), 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 Keensburg?
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 Keensburg's scale — its 6b band and its 223-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Keensburg'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 Keensburg’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Keensburg's own scale — its own ~223-day season between 28°F freezes, the 166 acres it covers and 134 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Keensburg's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Keensburg's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 27 and Nov 5 and the ~223-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 134 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Keensburg, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Keensburg's boundary and the 166 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~223-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Keensburg's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Keensburg 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 Keensburg's 166 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Wabash County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Wabash 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 Wabash County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Keensburg's 166 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Keensburg you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 166 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 Keensburg-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisKeensburg sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides