Standard, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
The conditions favor cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens, among others — though every individual site edits that list with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Standard, 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 Standard 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 Standard — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Standard — the short answer
Standard, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 203 days between hard freezes, across 455 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 9
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~203
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 455 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 5b is Standard's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Standard's 203-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Standard
Each reading below is measured for Standard itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredStandard runs about 203 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
MeasuredStandard sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b.
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 Standard is in
Standard sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Standard's own centroid, and it is not what its county reads: Putnam County is mostly Interior River Valleys and Hills. The wider page above you is answering a different question about different ground.
What Grows in Standard
Every plant below cleared Standard's own zone 5b and its 203-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Standard?
Almost never — the real question is what to plant next. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 12; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 9 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 29 — 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 Standard
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Standard. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Granville TownshipUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- Bellino PeterUnderground Storage Tanks · 750 ft
- SILVER SPOON SWINE FARMCAFO · 0.7 mi
- Moew's Seed CoUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- SW of Kankakee RiverNitrate · 1.9 mi
- DOLLAR GENERAL 14428Brownfields · 2.1 mi
- Casey's General Store #1880Underground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- Mid American Growers, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Putnam County High SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- Granville Minit Mart #620Underground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- Granville Motor CompanyUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.4 mi
- Coye SerUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Standard'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 Standard.
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Standard
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Standard
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Standard, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Standard — Superfund (15 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (32 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.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Commission professional soil testing before any food production (test for heavy metals, VOCs, and SVOCs).
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Standard
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 Standard average
Your land is one point inside Standard
Everything above resolves to Standard as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 455 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 Standard Average
Standard Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Standard
- ●One soil character for all of Standard
- ●Frost dates read at Standard's scale: Apr 9 to Oct 29
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Standard's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Standard
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Standard, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Standard averages can't show:
We read public map data around Standard — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Standard average
How we know this about Standard
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 Standard’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 Standard
When does frost risk typically end in Standard?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Standard typically lands around Apr 9, 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 30.
When is the first frost in Standard?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Standard typically arrives around Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 15, so the watching starts about Sep 29 — about 203 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Standard?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Standard sees about 203 frost-free days — roughly Apr 9 through Oct 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 30 to Oct 15, about 168 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Standard?
The federal record around Standard runs heavier than most — 389 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (213), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out — so test the soil before planting food in the ground, and raised beds with clean imported soil grow well in the meantime. Even here, proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what's recorded and where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Standard?
From about Sep 29 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 Oct 29 (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 Oct 29. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Standard's scale — its 5b band and its 203-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Standard'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 Standard’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Standard's own scale — its own ~203-day season between 28°F freezes, the 455 acres it covers and 389 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Standard's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Standard's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 9 and Oct 29 and the ~203-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 389 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Standard, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Standard's boundary and the 455 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~203-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- Standard sits in the Central Corn Belt Plains — not the ecoregion its county mostly readsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Standard's 455 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Putnam County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Putnam 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 Putnam County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Standard's 455 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Standard you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 455 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.1 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 Standard-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisStandard sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides