Paderborn, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 7a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, california poppy, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Paderborn, 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 Paderborn 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 Paderborn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Paderborn — the short answer
Paderborn, Illinois: USDA zone 7a, about 232 days between hard freezes, across 96 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 7a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 24
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 11
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~232
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 96 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 Paderborn's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Paderborn's 232-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Paderborn
Each reading below is measured for Paderborn itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredPaderborn runs about 232 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
MeasuredPaderborn 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 Paderborn is in
Paderborn sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Paderborn's own centroid rather than borrowed from St. Clair County.
What Grows in Paderborn
Every plant below cleared Paderborn's own zone 7a and its 232-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Paderborn?
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 24; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 24 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 11 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
Documented around Paderborn
Survey cells within 31 miles of Paderborn checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 240 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Paderborn
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Paderborn. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- SKAER AUTO BODY & RUST REPAIRBrownfields · 1.3 mi
- Nollau Nurseries, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 2.7 mi
- SW edge of SmithtonNitrate · 3.6 mi
- Hwy 159 and Robinson School RdNitrate · 3.9 mi
- Stehls Trenching ServiceUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.2 mi
- BAKER AUTOBODYBrownfields · 4.3 mi
- Smithton PlazaUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- Nu Deal Oil CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- HY-DACBrownfields · 4.3 mi
- Hy-Dac Rubber Mfg DivUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.3 mi
- Smithton Township Road DistUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.5 mi
- B & J MarketUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.6 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Paderborn'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 Paderborn.
Total Sites
192
within ~10 miles of Paderborn
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
1 Superfund site (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Paderborn
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Paderborn
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Paderborn, PFAS runs higher than the national average — 7 sites within ~10 miles of Paderborn. Knowing it is half the work — and it's nothing a thoughtful grower can't plan for.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check your specific parcel in Paderborn
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 Paderborn average
Your land is one point inside Paderborn
Everything above resolves to Paderborn as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 96 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 Paderborn Average
Paderborn Average
- ●USDA Zones 7a, averaged across Paderborn
- ●One soil character for all of Paderborn
- ●Frost dates read at Paderborn's scale: Mar 24 to Nov 11
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Paderborn's 7a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Paderborn
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Paderborn, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Paderborn averages can't show:
We read public map data around Paderborn — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Paderborn average
How we know this about Paderborn
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 Paderborn’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 Paderborn
When does frost risk typically end in Paderborn?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Paderborn typically lands around Mar 24, 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 14.
When is the first frost in Paderborn?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Paderborn typically arrives around Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 28, so the watching starts about Oct 12 — about 232 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Paderborn?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Paderborn sees about 232 frost-free days — roughly Mar 24 through Nov 11, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 14 to Oct 28, about 197 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Paderborn?
The federal record around Paderborn is a meaningful one — 192 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (102), the nearest Brownfields record about 1.3 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 Paderborn?
From about Oct 12 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 11 (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 11. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Paderborn's scale — its 7a band and its 232-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Paderborn'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 Paderborn’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Paderborn's own scale — its own ~232-day season between 28°F freezes, the 96 acres it covers and 192 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Paderborn's own USDA hardiness band, zones 7aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Paderborn's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 24 and Nov 11 and the ~232-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 192 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Paderborn, the closest Brownfields record about 1.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Paderborn's boundary and the 96 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 7a and a ~232-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Paderborn's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Paderborn 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 Paderborn's 96 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom St. Clair County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom St. Clair 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 St. Clair County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Paderborn's 96 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Paderborn you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 96 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Brownfields record about 1.3 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 Paderborn-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisPaderborn sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.