Naplate, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Naplate, 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 Naplate 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 Naplate — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Naplate — the short answer
Naplate, Illinois: USDA zone 6a, about 210 days between hard freezes, across 104 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 7
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~210
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 104 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 6a is Naplate's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Naplate's 210-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Naplate
Each reading below is measured for Naplate itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredNaplate runs about 210 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
MeasuredNaplate sits in USDA hardiness zone 6a.
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 Naplate is in
Naplate sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Naplate's own centroid rather than borrowed from LaSalle County.
What Grows in Naplate
Every plant below cleared Naplate's own zone 6a and its 210-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Naplate?
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 10; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 7 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 3 — 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 Naplate
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Naplate. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- PILKINGTON NORTH AMERICASuperfund · 1000 ft
- PILKINGTON NORTH AMERICABrownfields · 1000 ft
- PILKINGTON NORTH AMERICAToxics Release Inventory · 1000 ft
- Village of NaplateUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- La Salle County Highway Dept.Underground Storage Tanks · 0.7 mi
- US SILICA COBrownfields · 0.9 mi
- CARGILL INCBrownfields · 1.1 mi
- States Land Improvement Corp.Underground Storage Tanks · 1.2 mi
- Ottawa Industrial Sand CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.3 mi
- Starved Rock Lock & DamUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.4 mi
- CARVS CHEMICAL CO OTTAWA LABBrownfields · 1.4 mi
- BWD AUTOMOTIVE CORPORATIONToxics Release Inventory · 1.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Naplate'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 Naplate.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Naplate
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Naplate
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Naplate, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Naplate — Superfund (9 sites) and PFAS (3 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
Superfund: Superfund sites represent the most severe contamination in the federal system.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Naplate
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 Naplate average
Your land is one point inside Naplate
Everything above resolves to Naplate as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 104 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 Naplate Average
Naplate Average
- ●USDA Zones 6a, averaged across Naplate
- ●One soil character for all of Naplate
- ●Frost dates read at Naplate's scale: Apr 7 to Nov 3
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Naplate's 6a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Naplate
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Naplate, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Naplate averages can't show:
We read public map data around Naplate — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Naplate average
How we know this about Naplate
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 Naplate’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 Naplate
When does frost risk typically end in Naplate?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Naplate typically lands around Apr 7, 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 28.
When is the first frost in Naplate?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Naplate typically arrives around Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 20, so the watching starts about Oct 4 — about 210 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Naplate?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Naplate sees about 210 frost-free days — roughly Apr 7 through Nov 3, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 28 to Oct 20, about 175 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Naplate?
The federal record around Naplate is a meaningful one — 239 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (127), the nearest Superfund record about 0.2 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Naplate?
From about Oct 4 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 3 (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 3. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Naplate's scale — its 6a band and its 210-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Naplate'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 Naplate’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Naplate's own scale — its own ~210-day season between 28°F freezes, the 104 acres it covers and 239 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Naplate's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Naplate's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 7 and Nov 3 and the ~210-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 239 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Naplate, the closest Superfund record about 0.2 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Naplate's boundary and the 104 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6a and a ~210-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Naplate'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 Naplate's 104 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom LaSalle County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom LaSalle 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 LaSalle County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Naplate's 104 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Naplate you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 104 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Superfund record about 0.2 miles 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 Naplate-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisNaplate sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides