Ste. Marie, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
Crops well matched to these conditions include cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — though what thrives on any one site still turns on its specific soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Ste. Marie, 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 Ste. Marie 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 Ste. Marie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
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Ste. Marie — the short answer
Ste. Marie, Illinois: USDA zone 6b, about 219 days between hard freezes, across 710 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 30
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 4
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~219
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 710 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 Ste. Marie's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Ste. Marie's 219-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Ste. Marie
Each reading below is measured for Ste. Marie itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredSte. Marie runs about 219 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
MeasuredSte. Marie 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 Ste. Marie is in
Ste. Marie sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Ste. Marie's own centroid rather than borrowed from Jasper County.
What Grows in Ste. Marie
Every plant below cleared Ste. Marie's own zone 6b and its 219-day season. Each card opens that plant's Illinois profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Ste. Marie?
Rarely: the season closes in stages, not all at once, and each stage has its crops. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 2; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 30 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 4 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. Here the season winds down slowly: late sowings, a real autumn harvest, and garlic in the ground before the first hard freeze.
Documented around Ste. Marie
Survey cells within 31 miles of Ste. Marie checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 152 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Ste. Marie
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Ste. Marie. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Mont Eagle Mills IncUnderground Storage Tanks · 1300 ft
- East Jr High SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 1600 ft
- The Gas Station LLCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2200 ft
- WEST LIBERTY-DUNDAS WATER DISTRICTPFAS · 3.5 mi
- Willow Hill SchoolUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.4 mi
- Hunt City Township BldgUnderground Storage Tanks · 4.7 mi
- GORDON MCCLURECAFO · 5.3 mi
- THJ Murphy, Inc.Underground Storage Tanks · 5.5 mi
- Planters Farm CtrUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- Union Oil Co Of CaliforniaUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.2 mi
- Matheny AmocoUnderground Storage Tanks · 6.6 mi
- 4 miles S of OblongNitrate · 7.0 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Ste. Marie'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 Ste. Marie.
Total Sites
91
within ~10 miles of Ste. Marie
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
2 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Ste. Marie
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Ste. Marie
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Ste. Marie, Underground Storage Tanks runs higher than the national average — 65 sites within ~10 miles of Ste. Marie. 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 Ste. Marie
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 Ste. Marie average
Your land is one point inside Ste. Marie
Everything above resolves to Ste. Marie as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 710 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 Ste. Marie Average
Ste. Marie Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Ste. Marie
- ●One soil character for all of Ste. Marie
- ●Frost dates read at Ste. Marie's scale: Mar 30 to Nov 4
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Ste. Marie's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Ste. Marie
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Ste. Marie, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Ste. Marie averages can't show:
We read public map data around Ste. Marie — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Ste. Marie average
How we know this about Ste. Marie
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 Ste. Marie’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 Ste. Marie
When does frost risk typically end in Ste. Marie?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Ste. Marie typically lands around Mar 30, 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 20.
When is the first frost in Ste. Marie?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Ste. Marie typically arrives around Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 21, so the watching starts about Oct 5 — about 219 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Ste. Marie?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Ste. Marie sees about 219 frost-free days — roughly Mar 30 through Nov 4, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 20 to Oct 21, about 184 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Ste. Marie?
The federal record around Ste. Marie shows 91 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (65), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles 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 Ste. Marie?
From about Oct 5 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 4 (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 4. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Ste. Marie's scale — its 6b band and its 219-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Ste. Marie'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 Ste. Marie’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Ste. Marie's own scale — its own ~219-day season between 28°F freezes, the 710 acres it covers and 91 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Ste. Marie's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Ste. Marie's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 30 and Nov 4 and the ~219-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 91 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Ste. Marie, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Ste. Marie's boundary and the 710 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~219-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Ste. Marie's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Ste. Marie 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 Ste. Marie's 710 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Jasper County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Jasper 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 Jasper County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Ste. Marie's 710 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Ste. Marie you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 710 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Ste. Marie-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisSte. Marie sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides