Scipio, Indiana, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a range where zone-matched perennials and frost-aware annual timing set what succeeds.
Among the crops suited to this profile: cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens. The site-level story — soil, sun, drainage — decides the rest.
Even in Scipio, 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 Scipio 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 Scipio — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Scipio — the short answer
Scipio, Indiana: USDA zone 6b, about 216 days between hard freezes, across 735 acres of town.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 3
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 5
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~216
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Town area
- 735 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 Scipio's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Scipio's 216-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Scipio
Each reading below is measured for Scipio itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredScipio runs about 216 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
MeasuredScipio 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 Scipio is in
Scipio sits in the Eastern Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Eastern Temperate Forests. That is read at Scipio's own centroid rather than borrowed from Jennings County.
What Grows in Scipio
Every plant below cleared Scipio's own zone 6b and its 216-day season. Each card opens that plant's Indiana profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Scipio?
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 6; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 3 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 5 — 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 Scipio
Survey cells within 31 miles of Scipio checked for spotted lanternfly, none carrying a detection — a surveyed negative, not an absence of looking. Nearest documented record 45 miles off. What to watch for.
What's on the federal record near Scipio
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Scipio. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- ALEXANDERS STATIONUnderground Storage Tanks · 1.1 mi
- WATTS ELECTRIC INCBrownfields · 1.6 mi
- ERICH K'S BODY SHOPBrownfields · 2.7 mi
- DECATUR MOLD TOOL & ENGINEERING INCBrownfields · 4.0 mi
- GARRIS AUTO BODYBrownfields · 4.2 mi
- GT INDUSTRIES, INC.Toxics Release Inventory · 4.6 mi
- MCKINNEY JIM FORD CHRY PLY DODBrownfields · 4.7 mi
- Casey's General Store 3593Underground Storage Tanks · 4.9 mi
- METALDYNE LLCToxics Release Inventory · 5.1 mi
- IN DOT North Vernon Unit Site 65502Underground Storage Tanks · 5.2 mi
- INDOT NORTH VERNON UNIT SITE 65502Brownfields · 5.2 mi
- DAVE O'MARA PLANT 1Toxics Release Inventory · 5.2 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Scipio'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 Scipio.
Total Sites
128
within ~10 miles of Scipio
Risk Level
Moderate
Highest-severity
13 Toxics Release Inventory facilities
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Scipio
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Scipio
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Scipio, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Scipio — PFAS (3 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (13 sites). That's not a problem with your land — it's information about it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Scipio
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 Scipio average
Your land is one point inside Scipio
Everything above resolves to Scipio as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 735 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 Scipio Average
Scipio Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Scipio
- ●One soil character for all of Scipio
- ●Frost dates read at Scipio's scale: Apr 3 to Nov 5
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Scipio's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Scipio
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Scipio, Indiana — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Scipio averages can't show:
We read public map data around Scipio — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Scipio average
How we know this about Scipio
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 Scipio’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 Scipio
When does frost risk typically end in Scipio?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Scipio typically lands around Apr 3, 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 24.
When is the first frost in Scipio?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Scipio typically arrives around Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 22, so the watching starts about Oct 6 — about 216 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Scipio?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Scipio sees about 216 frost-free days — roughly Apr 3 through Nov 5, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 24 to Oct 22, about 181 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Scipio?
The federal record around Scipio shows 128 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (62), the nearest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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 Scipio?
From about Oct 6 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 5 (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 5. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Scipio's scale — its 6b band and its 216-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Scipio'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 Scipio’s own scale
7 of the readings below were taken at Scipio's own scale — its own ~216-day season between 28°F freezes, the 735 acres it covers and 128 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Scipio's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Scipio's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 3 and Nov 5 and the ~216-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 128 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Scipio, the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Scipio's boundary and the 735 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~216-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Scipio's own centroid, the Eastern Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
- Lanternfly survey cells around Scipio 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 Scipio's 735 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Jennings County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Jennings County
- The growing challenges every Indiana grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Indiana
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Jennings County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Scipio's 735 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Scipio you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 735 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Underground Storage Tanks record about 1.1 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 Scipio-wide figureread your own land →
More in Indiana
Wider growing context
What grows across IndianaScipio sits outside our named growing regions, so Indiana as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides