Badger, Iowa, sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a — a band that supports both cool-season staples and warm-season crops chosen to fit the local frost window.
On paper, cabbage, cranberry, lavender, and collard greens all suit these conditions — on the ground, soil, sun, and drainage make the final call.
Even in Badger, 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 Badger 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 Badger — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Badger — the short answer
Badger, Iowa: USDA zone 5a, about 188 days between hard freezes, across 720 acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 5a
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Apr 16
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Oct 21
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~188
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 720 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 5a is Badger's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Badger's 188-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Badger
Each reading below is measured for Badger itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredBadger runs about 188 days between hard freezes — a moderate growing season.
There is room for the full run of cool-season crops plus a warm-season main crop, but the calendar is tight enough that a late spring or early fall frost still decides how much finishes.
Time warm-season transplants to your last hard freeze, and a few weeks of season extension turns a near-miss harvest into a sure one.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredBadger sits in USDA hardiness zone 5a.
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 Badger is in
Badger sits in the Western Corn Belt Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Badger's own centroid rather than borrowed from Webster County.
What Grows in Badger
Every plant below cleared Badger's own zone 5a and its 188-day season. Each card opens that plant's Iowa profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Badger?
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 19; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Apr 16 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Oct 21 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. The tail of the season still works: sixty-day crops into late summer, quick greens after, garlic last of all.
What's on the federal record near Badger
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Badger. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- 090N28W15BB 1931Badger 1Nitrate · 300 ft
- 090N28W15BBBC 03303 1948Badger 2Nitrate · 500 ft
- BADGER FASTWAYUnderground Storage Tanks · 600 ft
- NELS PEDERSON CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 900 ft
- NELS PEDERSON COMPANY INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1000 ft
- JOHANSONS SEED & MILLING COUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- WEBSTER COUNTY MAINTENANCE SHOPUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- 090N28W15BBCB 23299 1973Badger 3Nitrate · 1100 ft
- NEW COOPERATIVE INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 1100 ft
- 090N28W27BCC 01410 1942Nitrate · 2.3 mi
- 090N28W24DAD 02034 1945Nitrate · 3.2 mi
- FORT DODGE REGIONAL AIRPORTBrownfields · 4.5 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Badger'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 Badger.
Total Sites
438
within ~10 miles of Badger
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
2 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Badger
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Badger
Highest-Severity Sites
Know Before You Grow
- •Underground tanks leak petroleum as they age — near a former filling station, test the soil.
- •On a private well, test for nitrates: above 10 mg/L the water needs treatment before irrigating.
- •Near a brownfield, raised beds of imported soil give your food clean ground.
Check your specific parcel in Badger
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 Badger average
Your land is one point inside Badger
Everything above resolves to Badger as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 720 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 city 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 Badger Average
Badger Average
- ●USDA Zones 5a, averaged across Badger
- ●One soil character for all of Badger
- ●Frost dates read at Badger's scale: Apr 16 to Oct 21
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Badger's 5a
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Badger
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Badger, Iowa — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Badger averages can't show:
We read public map data around Badger — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Badger average
How we know this about Badger
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Badger’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 city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-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 Badger
When does frost risk typically end in Badger?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Badger typically lands around Apr 16, 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 May 7.
When is the first frost in Badger?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Badger typically arrives around Oct 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 7, so the watching starts about Sep 21 — about 188 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Badger?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Badger sees about 188 frost-free days — roughly Apr 16 through Oct 21, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer May 7 to Oct 7, about 153 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Badger?
The federal record around Badger is a meaningful one — 438 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (203), the nearest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile 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 Badger?
From about Sep 21 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 21 (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 21. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Badger's scale — its 5a band and its 188-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Badger'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 Badger’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Badger's own scale — its own ~188-day season between 28°F freezes, the 720 acres it covers and 438 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Badger's own USDA hardiness band, zones 5aUSDA PHZM 2023
- Badger's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Apr 16 and Oct 21 and the ~188-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 438 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Badger, the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Badger's boundary and the 720 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 5a and a ~188-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Badger's own centroid, the Western Corn Belt PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Badger's 720 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Webster County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Webster County
- The growing challenges every Iowa grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Iowa
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Webster County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Badger's 720 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Badger you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 720 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record under a tenth of a mile 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 Badger-wide figureread your own land →
More in Iowa
Wider growing context
What grows across IowaBadger sits outside our named growing regions, so Iowa as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides