Taylor Ridge, Illinois, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5b — room for a real mix of vegetables, fruit, and perennials matched to the local frost calendar.
Expect cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens to be strong candidates here; the deciding factors on any one parcel stay local — soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Taylor Ridge, 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 Taylor Ridge 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 Taylor Ridge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Taylor Ridge — the short answer
Taylor Ridge, Illinois: USDA zone 5b, about 203 days between hard freezes, across 993 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 5b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 8
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 28
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~203
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 993 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 Taylor Ridge's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Taylor Ridge's 203-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Taylor Ridge
Each reading below is measured for Taylor Ridge itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredTaylor Ridge 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
MeasuredTaylor Ridge 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 Taylor Ridge is in
Taylor Ridge sits in the Interior River Valleys and Hills — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Taylor Ridge's own centroid rather than borrowed from Rock Island County.
What Grows in Taylor Ridge
Every plant below cleared Taylor Ridge'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 Taylor Ridge?
Usually not — gardeners here simply switch what goes in the ground as the season moves. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 11; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 8 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 28 — 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.
What's on the federal record near Taylor Ridge
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Taylor Ridge. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- Mueller Implement Co.Underground Storage Tanks · 1500 ft
- Mueller GeraldUnderground Storage Tanks · 1900 ft
- DECLERCK BROTHERS SWINE FARMCAFO · 0.9 mi
- Verschoore DonUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.7 mi
- MURDOCK FARMS - TAYLOR RIDGECAFO · 1.9 mi
- OAK FARMSCAFO · 2.4 mi
- LC FAMILY FARMSCAFO · 2.5 mi
- Mer-Roc Fs Reynolds PlantUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.0 mi
- ESG WATTS INC. - SANITARY LANDFILLSuperfund · 3.1 mi
- ESG WATTS INCBrownfields · 3.4 mi
- USF Holland, Inc. (RI)Underground Storage Tanks · 3.6 mi
- Mzv VortacUnderground Storage Tanks · 3.7 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Taylor Ridge'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 Taylor Ridge.
Total Sites
520
within ~10 miles of Taylor Ridge
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
7 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Taylor Ridge
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Taylor Ridge
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Taylor Ridge, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Taylor Ridge — CAFO (6 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (40 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
CAFO: CAFOs pose a different contamination profile than chemical sources.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Wash all produce consumed raw thoroughly, especially leafy greens grown near CAFOs.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Taylor Ridge
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 Taylor Ridge average
Your land is one point inside Taylor Ridge
Everything above resolves to Taylor Ridge as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 993 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 Taylor Ridge Average
Taylor Ridge Average
- ●USDA Zones 5b, averaged across Taylor Ridge
- ●One soil character for all of Taylor Ridge
- ●Frost dates read at Taylor Ridge's scale: Apr 8 to Oct 28
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Taylor Ridge's 5b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Taylor Ridge
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Taylor Ridge, Illinois — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Taylor Ridge averages can't show:
We read public map data around Taylor Ridge — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Taylor Ridge average
How we know this about Taylor Ridge
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 Taylor Ridge’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 Taylor Ridge
When does frost risk typically end in Taylor Ridge?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Taylor Ridge typically lands around Apr 8, 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 29.
When is the first frost in Taylor Ridge?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Taylor Ridge typically arrives around Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 14, so the watching starts about Sep 28 — about 203 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Taylor Ridge?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Taylor Ridge sees about 203 frost-free days — roughly Apr 8 through Oct 28, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 29 to Oct 14, about 168 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Taylor Ridge?
The federal record around Taylor Ridge is a meaningful one — 520 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (310), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 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 Taylor Ridge?
From about Sep 28 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 28 (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 28. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Taylor Ridge's scale — its 5b band and its 203-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Taylor Ridge'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 Taylor Ridge’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Taylor Ridge's own scale — its own ~203-day season between 28°F freezes, the 993 acres it covers and 520 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Taylor Ridge's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Taylor Ridge's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 8 and Oct 28 and the ~203-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 520 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Taylor Ridge, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 0.3 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Taylor Ridge's boundary and the 993 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5b and a ~203-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Taylor Ridge's own centroid, the Interior River Valleys and HillsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Taylor Ridge's 993 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Rock Island County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Rock Island 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 Rock Island County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Taylor Ridge's 993 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Taylor Ridge you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 993 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 Taylor Ridge-wide figureread your own land →
More in Illinois
Wider growing context
What grows across IllinoisTaylor Ridge sits outside our named growing regions, so Illinois as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides